Le Tour de la Confusion
by Malva Pulce
Summary: Toudou Jinpachi is the last virgin of the cycling world. Soon to turn 18, he's starting to feel the pressure on his shoulders. Something must be done! What happens to his plans when Fukutomi announces that their team―along with Sohoku―are going for a holiday abroad? And to none other destination than Europe and Le Tour de France! Meanwhile, Shinkai gets the proposition of his life.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: Yowamushi Pedal belongs to Wataru Watanabe. I gain no financial benefit of this story.

A/N: I'm writing this fic originally in my native language (Finnish) and translating it as it progresses. I need to write in Finnish, otherwise my language skills can't keep up with my storytelling. It's a tedious task, so I appreciate everyone who takes time to read my silly little fic. :) Also posted on AO3.

Summary: Toudou Jinpachi is the last virgin of the cycling world. Soon to turn 18, he's starting to feel the pressure on his shoulders. Something must be done! But what happens to his plans when Fukutomi announces that their team – along with Sohoku – are going for a holiday abroad? And to none other destination than Europe and Le Tour de France!

Meanwhile, Shinkai gets the proposition of his life.

This is mainly Toumaki and Shinara but if you wear your yaoi glasses, you might see hints of other pairings, too. :)

Warnings: Mature yaoi scenes that will follow later in the fic, some underage drinking too, and spoilers up to the anime and the scanlations of manga, but not the raws because unfortunately I can't read Japanese (yet).

Beta: ladyleopardy (Tumblr by the same name)

* * *

**Le Tour de la Confusion**

~o~

**Chapter 1 – The Last Virgin on Earth**

~o~

Toudou Jinpachi was the last virgin of the cycling world.

This fact was not only a sad one, but also completely incomprehensible, given that he possessed undeniable charm, eye-caressing looks, an impeccable sense of fashion and a fan base ready to follow him to the end of the world. Actually, it was downright unbearable that he had to carry the stigma of a virgin as the only person of his class and chosen type of sport.

Okay, if spoken truthfully, Toudou was pretty sure that the four-eyed otaku, Onoda Sakamichi of Sohoku team, was also a virgin. But that was hardly worth mentioning. Toudou was in a totally different league to Onoda who represented that small and unlucky group of people that had poor chances to engage themselves in sexual interaction with a member of their own species. Or a member of any species, that is.

But that was not the point here. You wouldn't even mention Toudou Jinpachi and Onoda the Otaku in the same sentence. Besides, Toudou was a third-year, soon to turn 18, and after that he could never admit that he hadn't been with anyone yet. Not that he had admitted it before, either. He wouldn't have. If somebody had asked. Which they hadn't. Which was pretty strange. Boys tended to brag of their experiences; exaggerate, naturally, but talk about it all the same. Why had not one of his teammates ever wanted to know how many girls had Toudou been with? Were they just not interested? Or did they think that Toudou didn't have the nerve to bed his fans? Since Shinkai had started going out with a girl, guys had bombarded him with questions. Shinkai had refused to answer and stayed mysterious. That clown, pretending to be _soooo_ mature.

Toudou had stolen glances at his teammates, trying to figure out their level of experience. Fuku had definitely had girls, he was the ace after all and all-around popular. Arakita? He'd been a delinquent and part of a gang before joining the bicycle club, and was always responsible for the wildest stories. Probably experienced. Izumida? Was it possible to have sex with your own pecs? Unsure. Manami? Virgin, definitely. So Toudou had at least two inexperienced acquintances.

A refreshing wave of relief washed over him.

Except that… no. Manami had a childhood friend, that geeky girl who dressed like a pre-scholar. The girl seemed to like her friend a bit more than platonically. Besides, Manami was only a first-year, like Onoda, and didn't have the same kind of pressure on his shoulders.

Aargh, damn it.

Toudou smashed his head against the headboard of his bed out of sheer frustration. Oh the golden days when he could concentrate on cycling alone!

He couldn't really point his finger at the moment when the issue had started to matter. At what point had something else beside the ecstasy of races, winning, beating your opponents, beating _yourself_, begun to snatch his attention? At first he had ignored those sensations – sports had a nice side-effect of keeping your mind occupied – but somehow days just passed and the small gnawing at the back of his mind (and in his pants) became more persistent.

And then there's a morning when you wake up, realize that you're soon turning 18, and that you're still a virgin. And to make it worse, you have never even dated anyone.

Not that Toudou had actually wanted to; most of the high school girls were annoying, giggling airheads, and to put up with them one had to be on good medication, but he could have slept with some of them if he wouldn't have needed to look at their useless faces the morning after. Stupid hormones, he blamed them wholly!

So, he couldn't pinpoint when the virgin issue had started to matter, but it was clear that it would never ever mark as unimportant again (only perhaps when he'd sit in a nursing home, crapping his diapers and his dick wouldn't move of its own accord). Toudou couldn't continue ignoring this slightly disturbing and yet so interesting thing called sex if he wanted to keep his position amongst his friends. The other guys were used to him having his say in whatever they were talking about, be it the autumn fashion or the width of bike tyres. If he suddenly lost his words, everyone would immediately realize that _he had no clue_.

During the first year conversations between his classmates had mostly been harmless joking. Such as:

"_Ohhoho, boobies!"_

"_Hey look, you can totally see her panties!"_

"_Let me see that porn magazine!"_ (Bikini commercials.)

During the second year talks had taken a slightly more serious tone.

"_Shinkai, who was that girl you were with at the New Year's party?"_

"_Are you going out with her?"_

"_Which condom brand is the best?"_

Then the spring break came, the third school year began, and suddenly everyone seemed to be a year older, even though only a few weeks had passed. Conversations didn't beat around the bush anymore; it was _assumed_ that everyone had a sex life. After all, who could be such a loser as to not have been intimate with the opposite sex at the age of 17?

Each day passing, it became harder and harder for Toudou to evade the subject. For example, today at the lunch break when Arakita had abruptly changed the conversation from the upcoming math test to Shinkai and his girlfriend and then to the home run (count an ex-baseball player to use baseball metaphors). This was what had occurred:

"Shinkai," Arakita had said. "Does your chick blow you?" Okay, so maybe he was talking about the third base and not the home run, but that wasn't the point here. The point was that only a minute ago he had been complaining about the calculator ban in math tests.

Shinkai had casually placed a piece of salad in his mouth and chewed it with all the peace in the world. "Don't call Ayane a chick."

"Oh boo hoo! Just answer the question, prude."

"I don't see a reason why I should answer that."

"So she doesn't," Arakita had summed up. "That's a shame. You're missing out a lot." It wasn't specified if he was referring to his own experiences or the information acquired from online videos with XXX ratings.

"Some girls find it not so appealing," Izumida had said.

"And some people think sex should only be had in the dark, under the blankets, and in the missionary position", Arakita had noted. "You shouldn't generalize. Many chicks like it when they get over the initial surprise."

"Well, it's a two-way street in this matter, too," Shinkai had admitted, hinting between the lines. That had made Fuku nod in approval.

Toudou had listened silently. And every passing minute the load hanging onto his back had increased by a few extra pounds. This was the longest time he had kept silent in the company of his friends. He had to say something. Had to say something! Anything would go!

"Some people say that anal sex is better than the regular stuff."

Eh? He was pretty sure that was _not_ what he had intended to say.

Guys had stared at him for a few seconds, somewhat stunned. Then Arakita had patted his shoulder and said that it was easier to get a girl to blow you than to get her to allow the back door. That was when the conversation had dried out, because Fuku had grunted he didn't want to listen to back door stories while eating his lunch.

But nobody had asked Toudou about his experiences. Nobody ever asked!

Something just wasn't right here.

And that was why he was now lying awake on his bed, sweating over the subject.

It was not like he could talk about it directly. Any kind of boasting or comparing your achievements was fine, but if you wanted to seriously discuss about starting your sex life and problems surrounding it, you would get laughed at and possibly left out of the group. Because that was not how guys talked about stuff.

Toudou didn't have the nerve to bring it up… unless it was with one certain person.

He rolled onto his side and grabbed his cell from the nightstand, his fingers automatically pushing the buttons to type a message.

'_Hey, Maki-chan, are you a virgin?'_

_Send_, before he could think about it twice. Why would he, though? It was just Maki-chan. Toudou could ask him whatever he wanted to. Maki-chan sometimes pretended to get annoyed but Toudou knew that his messages actually cheered the green-haired climber up.

Only then he realized it was past midnight.

Oh well, Maki-chan was hardly asleep yet. And even if he were, he should have muted his phone. Nothing Toudou could do about it now.

He placed his cell back on the nightstand and rolled on his back, staring at the ceiling.

He had to get a grip. He had to get rid of this burden. It was clear that the issue wouldn't leave him alone before he'd taken care of it. Starting tomorrow, he would begin looking for a girl to fit his purposes. Shouldn't be too hard. After all, he had a school full of admirers, and he knew how to articulate eloquently. There was often a herd of girls hanging around outside the club room – and they were definitely not interested in cycling. It would take him a week, maximum two. After that he wouldn't have to feel so out of place amongst the guys, like that 40-year-old virgin, the protagonist of an awkward American film he'd seen some time ago.

How on Earth had he let it get this far? He had always been aware of his fans, but not really thought about sleeping with them. Surely there were athletes who used their fame to get laid. The girls hanging around celebrities were positively begging to 'have their clam pounded', like Arakita had said. Toudou had no idea where he came up with his awful metaphors.

His eyes wandered in the dark, ending up on a poster on the wall where Arashiro Yukiya posed in colours of Team Europcar. Arashiro would totally have used his fame to his advantage. Toudou was sure that the guy had had his share of ladies even if his face wasn't taken out of a fashion magazine.

But now he needed to sleep, otherwise he would spend the next day nodding off in his seat, and that was not something Toudou Jinpachi was famous for. He reached for his phone to set up the alarm and noticed an envelope blinking on the screen. Maki-chan had answered him.

Toudou opened the message. Maki-chan was usually quite pithy, and that was the case this time, too. The message consisted of three words only.

'_You damned freak.'_

* * *

The next day Fuku dropped a bomb. A bomb that had Toudou momentarily forget his plan to get rid of his virginity.

Fuku had summoned Hakogaku's Inter High team to the club room before lessons started. He'd informed them that he had an important matter to discuss. Everyone was present, except for Manami. It wasn't really a surprise.

"Dear members of Hakogaku cycling club," Captain began. Those words coming out of anyone else's mouth would have made an audience burst into laughter, but Fuku sounded honourable, whatever he said. "What would you say if I told you that we're going for a little excursion?"

"Where? To Chiba?"

"A bit further than that."

"Hokkaido?"

"Hiroshima?"

"The Sohoku team is coming with us. That was the condition for us to get a group discount of the flight tickets, and we need a supervisor to come along, so Sohoku's Mr. Pierre has promised to take on the job. The thing is just that everyone must invest a bit of their own money for the trip. The accommodation is arranged but we must pay for our meals and moving around in the destination ourselves. I was thinking we could rent a car and…"

"Captain," Izumida interrupted. "Where exactly are we going?"

Fuku cleared his throat. "I'm going to tell you but you must promise to try to keep it together. Especially you, Toudou."

Toudou snorted. "Pfft, I'm always calm and composed." But the air was already crackling with excitement. Everyone was alert. Even Arakita who'd been nodding off against the lockers had straightened his back and turned his sharp gaze on their ace.

"I have to ask you not to talk about the subject unnecessarily so that the other clubs won't start complaining about the school favouring us. And this is quite exceptional, I must say. We just got an opportunity that couldn't be turned down. I need everyone's confirmation by tomorrow, if you are coming or not, because the flight tickets must be booked soon. We'll be leaving in two weeks."

"Yeah, but to where?" The captain sure was mysterious today. Even Shinkai and Izumida were starting to lose their patience.

"To see the greatest event of the cycling world."

The club room witnessed four simultaneous sharp breaths. "You mean..?"

No. No, it couldn't be. Because there were still some laws of nature in this world and one of them was huge distances. Another one was the fact that no one so early in their cycling career could possibly get to witness the biggest, most famous cycling tournament on the planet.

"Yes." Fuku rarely emitted any feelings but now his whole posture was beaming. His eyes were glowing and lips were spread into a wide grin. "We're going to see…"

Four young men started to jump up and down and squeal like little girls. However, after a few seconds they noticed that the squealing was coming from the direction of Toudou.

"Are you shitting us, Juichi?" Shinkai asked.

"Are you sure that the school will support us?" Izumida asked.

"Is the whole Sohoku team coming too?" Toudou asked.

"If this is supposed to be a joke, I'll have you know that we _will_ kick your ass, captain or not," Arakita said.

"It's not a joke. In two weeks we'll be sitting on a plane, heading towards Europe and…"

"Tour de France!"


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2 – Up in the Air **

~o~

"What fucking crap is this?"

"Just for your information, Arakita, airplane food has never been awarded Michelin stars."

"Is this really French cooking? And they say it's one of the finest cuisines in the world!" Arakita was poking his food with a plastic fork. The dish did look like tasteless crap. Two slices of grey, artificial-looking meat, overcooked vegetables, watery sauce, and a piece of dry bread. Toudou had not yet dared to taste his own dish, but after the show that Arakita was putting up, he'd be sure to praise it, no matter how gross it was.

"Taste it yourself. God damn, _que merde_!" Just for their trip, Arakita had memorized some useful phrases, aka swear words.

Toudou tasted.

_Hrrgh!_

Christ on a stick! Like a piece of cardboard soaked in mud water. Cold and slimy, and utterly unappealing. Somewhere in the back there lurked a faintly beef kind of aftertaste which made him hope he was imagining it. He swallowed quickly and tried some vegetables. Even worse. He probably could have hidden his disgust if Arakita hadn't stared at him so intently.

"Told you", his travelling companion said. "This is not suitable food for people. I really hope they have something else to serve."

"Not for free." Reluctantly, Toudou took another forkful, chewed quickly and swallowed with a gulp of water. Oh dear lord above. Had the flight been any shorter, he wouldn't have touched his plate again.

He managed to down half of his so-called meal, but then his stomach started to protest this uncommon way of eating (don't think about it, just swallow, gulp water and some air with it) or simply the poor quality of food. When a stewardess came to collect the dishes, he was able to hand over a plate that looked like at least half of its content had been eaten. Arakita's meal was practically untouched.

Toudou asked the stewardess to bring him a cup of tea and leaned back in his seat, sighing. He was still hungry. Maybe Shinkai had taken along enough protein bars to share with his teammates.

While sipping his tea, Toudou scanned the papers he'd printed: a map of this year's Tour de France route and some general information about the race. It would start at Corsica. Or actually, it had already started; at the moment cyclists were on their way from Nice to the Pyrenees. After the mountain stage they'd be taken to the North-Eastern part of the country to race across the country all the way to the Alps. Toudou and his travelling mates were meant to catch the race from the 12th stage called Fougères and then follow it until the end. A ten day trip. Ten days in France, watching the race of all road races. Toudou couldn't think of a better way to spend a holiday.

It wouldn't have been possible without Sohoku's dingbat coach. Mr. Pierre had some acquaintances in France – who knew, maybe he was originally French himself – and he'd managed to arrange them a half-free car and a couple of accommodations for along the way. There had been some talking about renting bikes as well, and keeping that in mind, everyone had packed their training clothes. The only downside was the fact that there were 15 of them and they had to squash themselves into a minivan and possible sleep in it or in tents for the nights that they couldn't find cheap accommodation. Surprisingly, nobody was upset about Sohoku coming along. Sure, they were rivals, but on this trip they shared a common goal. Toudou was only too happy to go on a holiday with Maki-chan. They really didn't meet often enough. Besides, if you made the mistake of listening to Imaizumi and Naruko, it sounded like Sohoku's team was perfectly capable of arguing amongst themselves.

The upcoming holiday had made Toudou forget his goal to get rid of his virginity by the end of summer. The trip to France could be seen as a hitch but actually, when you thought about it, it was the other way around. A world-famous sporting event was bound to have tons of cycling fans, and undoubtedly Toudou's oriental exoticism would appeal to European girls. Wasn't there even a saying about French girls being easy? Or was it 'dead girls'?

In any case, the holiday could speed up his mission. There was the problem of finding a suitable place, because really, who'd engage themselves in a sexual act when there were14 other people sleeping in the same van? He'd have to make sure to find a girl who could provide them with a suitable place.

In the seat next to him, Arakita was slurping his Bepsi noisily. Toudou turned to face him.

"Do you know if French girls are easy?"

"Hmh?"

"Well… y'know?"

"No, I don't."

"I mean–"

"I know what you mean," Arakita interrupted. When he spoke, a strong aroma of cola drink wafted into Toudou's face. A few more minutes and he would start burping. "I was saying I don't know what they are like. The hell I'd know about French chicks?"

Toudou straightened his neck, exhaling. "I was just thinking."

Arakita was quiet for a minute, seeming to muse over the subject. "Scandinavian girls are. Easy."

Toudou got a vision of a tanned blonde Amazon with legs long enough to reach the sky. Weren't all Scandinavians two meters tall? He wasn't sure if he'd have the guts to try to hit on a girl that huge.

"I can guarantee you no one in France has heard of you," Arakita offered helpfully.

"I didn't say they had."

"But you thought about it."

Toudou snorted, deciding to change the subject. After all, Arakita was completely the wrong person to discuss sexual relationships with. "The 12th and 13th stages are flats. After that it gets hilly, then flat again and then they'll reach the Alps." That was the stage Toudou was looking forward to the most. He wasn't called the Mountain God for nothing.

To tell the truth, people called him the Sleeping Beauty. He didn't completely understand why. Like, wouldn't a bit more of a masculine nickname have been more fitting?

Arakita stared at him for a long while, as if intending to point out that Toudou had changed the subject too abruptly but he rarely skipped a chance to talk about cycling.

He jabbed his finger onto Toudou's print. "Why do they _fly_ to Paris from the Alps? Are there man-eating bears on the way or is there some other reason why they can't race it?"

"Maybe they'd exceed the overall time limit?"

"They should have axed from some other part of the competition. It's called Tour de France, which means they should race around France, not skip some stages."

"Maybe Fuku knows why. Or Mr. Pierre."

Arakita sneered which could have meant that Toudou was right or that nobody could be more clueless than Sohoku's chubby coach.

"Well, we'll probably find out when we get there." 

* * *

Three hours into the take-off, Toudou was getting bored. And not just normally bored but extremely, thoroughly, it's-the-end-of-the-world bored. There was nothing sensible to do on the plane but it wasn't yet so late that he'd like to try sleeping. He had listened to some music, read a book, fiddled with his phone, played with his PS Vita and exchanged a few words with Arakita, but then his teammate got so pithy and irritated that Toudou gave up chatting. These activities took roughly two hours. The third one he'd spent examining his fingernails and counting minutes.

He was about to suggest that they should play cards even though he was lousy with them, but Arakita bent down to pull a laptop out of his bag and settled to watch a movie. Hey, that wasn't such a bad idea! Why hadn't Toudou thought about taking his computer with him? Because it wouldn't have been able to fit into his bag and there wasn't really time to use it in France. He had forgotten the 13-hour flight.

Toudou watched the movie out of the corner of his eye but after a couple of minutes it started to look too much like adult entertainment. _Uncensored_ adult entertainment. Jesus!

"Is that even legal in Japan?" he finally opened his mouth. The actors in the film were westerners but where had Arakita downloaded his video?

"It's legal online." Arakita had the patience to turn his eyes away from the screen only to fish for earphones in his bag and plug them in.

_Are you going to watch that while sitting next to me? _Not that Toudou had anything against porn, but there was a time and place for everything and on a plane surrounded by people wasn't either of them.

"You better keep your hands in sight the whole time," he said but Arakita probably couldn't hear him through his plugs.

The next fifteen minutes passed. Getting hungry again, Toudou asked the stewardess to bring him a sandwich. Shinkai was really stingy with his protein bars, anyway. Arakita didn't so much as bat an eye even though the plane staff saw what he was watching. The film wasn't as hardcore as Toudou has first dreaded, it was more of an example of the genre 'Erotica', but it still showed pretty much everything.

After downing his sandwich, he decided that he'd spent too many minutes sitting next to a half-mute porn addict. He stood up, stretching his muscles, and walked towards the front of the cabin until he reached the desired row of seats. For some reason Maki-chan had teamed up with Sohoku's new climbing wonder, Onoda Sakamichi.

Toudou rested his arm on the back of the aisle seat and peered down at the boy occupying it. "Hey Glasses-kun, wanna change seats with me?"

Onoda stared at him, alarmed. But that was how he always looked like, a hatchling that had fallen out of his nest and found himself in a conversation with a cat.

"W-why?"

"Yeah, why?" Maki-chan asked too.

"I need to speak with Maki-chan."

"Well, we're having a strategy meeting right now."

"Four-eyes is reading a manga and smiling his happy idiot's smile at it."

Maki-chan's eyes didn't waver. "It's a diversion."

"I'm sure."

"Oi, Headband, you can sit here if you like," Naruko Shoukichi offered from the next row. "Hotshot followed me even though I clearly stated I didn't want to sit with him."

"I followed you and climbed over you to sit in the window seat?" Imaizumi Shunsuke remarked. He had plugs in his ears too and he was holding a thick book in his hands. Seemed like an all-around silent and inconspicuous travel mate. Toudou had heard that Naruko and Imaizumi tended to quarrel a lot. Sure, they both were competing over the title of Sohoku's future ace but apparently their personalities clashed as well.

"Yes, that's exactly what happened," Naruko said.

Imaizumi sighed, immersing himself in his book again.

"Thank you, Naruko-kun, but I need to speak with Maki-chan," Toudou said. "Hey Onoda-kun, let's switch just for a while! You'd get to know your opponents a bit better. The person sitting next to me is really nice. I'm sure you'd have a lot to talk about. You could show him your manga." There were cute, half-naked under-aged girls posing on the book cover. Onoda would have so much in common with Arakita.

The boy was glancing sideways down the aisle. "Who's sitting next to you?"

"Um, Arakita."

Onoda's mouth formed a silent scream.

"Are you trying to throw an innocent little boy to the wolves?" Maki-chan asked. "Go back to your seat, Toudou. There's a lot of turbulence above the ocean."

"Then it's good that we're not above the ocean anymore."

"I can go somewhere else for a while if Toudou-san wants to sit here…" Onoda stammered. "I'll just go and see what Manami-kun is doing."

"You don't have to–" Maki-chan began, but Four-eyes was already scurrying down the aisle towards the back where the junior of Hakogaku's litter was probably driving Izumida up the wall. Onoda's appearance would give Izumida an excuse to move to sit next to Arakita and everyone would be happy. Really, Toudou should get a medal for his efforts for the air travelling satisfactory.

"And that's how you get rid of bothersome grubs." He swung himself over to sit on the seat Onoda had abandoned and lifted his leg to rest it casually over the other. Maki-chan had already spread his characteristic scent in the row. Toudou remembered it well because Maki-chan smelled like freshly cut grass. Grass, and money. He had no idea how someone could smell like cold, hard cash, but Maki-chan was from an opulent family after all. Opposite to what one might think, the smell was not unpleasant. More like fresh and… leafy. "So, what has my favourite Spidey been doing during the flight?"

"I've tried to sleep. I'd like to try it again so I'd prefer it if you kept it down."

"Always so polite, Maki-chan. It's only 3 pm. Come on, let's chat for a bit!"

The blue eyes turned to look at him, reluctant. "About what?"

"I don't know, about France?" _And the fact that you haven't answered my question._

Maki-chan picked up his bag and pulled out a book which he thrust over to Toudou. "There, read it."

A travel guide to France. Toudou placed it in his lap, unopened. "What are you looking forward to on this holiday?"

"Hmh, the Alpine stage."

"Me too! Man, there's hardly anything like it in Japan!"

Maki-chan huffed and pretended to look out of the window. Toudou just wasn't the person to give up so easily. Maki-chan was an exceptionally unsocial case but the victory was ever the sweeter when you got him to talk.

"It's a shame that Arashiro couldn't keep his position at the Corsica stage though."

"Hmph."

"I really hope we'll get a chance to cycle in France. How great would it be to tell everyone at home that we've cycled around in the Alps? Maybe we could have a little race there, too?"

This raised the tiniest spark of interest in Maki-chan, making him quickly peek at Toudou out of the corner of his eye. But then he turned towards the window again. The view consisted of clouds only. Maybe Maki-chan was admiring his reflection on the glass. Toudou wouldn't have done it, had he looked like that.

Not that Maki-chan was ugly or anything but… well, his features were sharp and pointy and his eyes along with his inverted eyebrows made him look like he'd suffered injustice his whole life, lived in a concentration camp or something. When his forced smile was added into the compilation, it was really like a grotesque horror movie clown – because Maki-chan only rarely smiled on his own. He did possess some sense of fashion, but his face ruined the first impression. Besides, who in the year 2013 wore their hair that long?

Toudou poked Maki-chan in the shoulder. "You sulking cause I beat you in the Inter High?"

He immediately got the green-haired climber's attention. "Good god, no! It was a fair race. Is that how little you think of me?"

Toudou shrugged. No, he didn't think so little of his opponent, but provocation was the best way to get people to end their pouting.

"You didn't even answer my question."

A silent huff left Makishima's lips. "Which question?"

Hmm, Toudou couldn't recall having asked so many questions lately. Naturally he'd called Maki-chan while packing his stuff, asking what he should bring with him and what kind of weather there was in France at the moment. Or in general. Because he had no clue. First Maki-chan told him to check the forecast online, but after some pressuring he'd succumbed and answered Toudou's questions. That's what Maki-chan was like.

"The one I sent you the other night."

"Don't you mean two weeks ago?"

"Heh, I was sure you knew which question I was talking about."

"Of course I did. I just fail to understand why I should answer it. How is that your business? And why are you even interested?"

"Why wouldn't I be? Isn't that a normal question for someone of our age?" If Maki-chan now remarked that the question would have been normal two years ago, Toudou would get a tad embarrassed. In that case he'd have to quickly come up with a good excuse for his curiosity.

"Has somebody asked you that?"

Toudou pretended to think. "No, I suppose not."

"You see? Normal people don't ask each other such questions."

"I disagree. The girls in our class gabble about it all the time."

"Well, girls maybe but they tend to talk about any kind of stuff."

"Perhaps boys should too," Toudou mused. "It would surely reduce the levels of insecurity and stress if you had someone to talk about it with."

Makishima sneered something Toudou couldn't catch. The window appeared to be amazingly interesting again. Toudou waited for a while and then without warning prodded his elbow between his reluctant chatting partner's ribs. This was easy, since Maki-chan had not one gram of fat in his body.

"Stop poking me!"

"I'll stop when you answer my question."

Maki-chan's jaw tightened. "I'm not going to talk about this on a plane where everyone can hear us."

"What are you not going to talk about?" came a voice behind them. Naruko had squeezed his face between the seats as much as he could and was puffing warm air onto their side.

The appearance of the little snotnose got Maki-chan to turn in on himself again, and this time Toudou gave up. He didn't feel like discussing the matter either while Naruko was snooping. He couldn't say that he really knew Sohoku's young sprinter but the boy gave away the impression of an uncontrollable blabbermouth.

Let's switch the topic then. "Have you ever been abroad, Maki-chan?"

"Yeah, I have."

"Really? Where?"

"Hawaii, Thailand."

"What about Europe?"

"When I was a kid, I went to Paris with my family."

"Ooh, so you do know France then!"

"I have no recollection of the trip, I was three years old."

"I reckoned you must have travelled some. Your family is insanely rich after all."

"We're not _insanely_ rich, just normally wealthy."

Two meaningful coughs could be heard from the row in front of them.

Toudou smirked. "See? Bison and Sunglasses agree with me."

The seat in front of him swayed when Sohoku's other sprinter sprung to his feet. The whole plane probably tilted a bit to the right. "Who are you calling a bison, you Barbie doll?"

_Barbie doll?!_

And Maki-chan had the nerve to chuckle at the insult. Toudou felt like pouting but unfortunately that strategy didn't work with his co-climber.

Ouch, the bull's bellowing was hurting his ears. Toudou blocked his other ear with his finger and continued to talk to Maki-chan. Tadokoro ceased his grumbling only when Kinjou told him to sit down before the staff would start to suspect an act of terrorism.

"Do you know how to speak French, Maki-chan?"

"No."

"Are you good at English?"

"Yeah, he is," came a remark from between the seats. Naruko was still trying to participate in their conversation. No surprise there, his travelling companion didn't seem very talkative.

"But it doesn't help in France. French people refuse to speak English," Maki-chan grunted. "You should know French to communicate with them."

"Damn! Well, fortunately we have Mr. Pierre with us." If the old man even knew French. He seemed to only speak vague Japanese with random English words thrown into the mix.

Maki-chan mumbled something.

"What was that?"

"Just wondering how I'm going to make it through spending ten days in the same car with you."

"Huh, Maki-chan! We're going to have tons of fun!" There was no doubt about it; he and Maki-chan were going to have a blast. He was not sure about the rest of the group, though. Kinjou and Tadokoro for example. Neither one of them appeared to have any sense of humour, and on top of that Tadokoro sounded like a rhino with serious gas issues and occupied the same amount of space. But perhaps those two had enough money to book a hotel room.

No, it was _Maki-chan_ who had a lot of money. Why couldn't he and Toudou book a room? That way they would avoid listening to the whining first-years and groaning savannah animals.

Toudou voiced his idea.

"Yeah, no. Not gonna happen," was Maki-chan's harsh reply.

"What, why not?"

"Number one: The hotels are full. Every single one is booked because of the Tour. Number two: Even if there was a room available, I wouldn't share it with you."

"Hnngh, Maki-chan, that's so insensitive!"

The green-haired climber huffed, dejected. "Toudou, seriously speaking, I'd really like to get some sleep. Would you please consider going back to your own seat?"

"Unfortunately that option is now out of the question."

"Why?"

"You see, Arakita started watching porn on his computer–"

There was an astounded yelp behind them.

"–and I suspect he has reached in his action the point that requires a seriously low morale to watch."

Maki-chan just stared at him.

Toudou leaned closer, whispering not-so-silently. "He's probably masturbating."

At that moment Naruko Shoukichi jumped to his feet and craned over the seats to holler at Kinjou. "Captain! Why in the name of everything that is pure and righteous did we have to bring this depraved troop of Hakogaku monkeys with us?" 

* * *

A/N: I have no idea why I made Arakita such a pervert, but I'm having so much fun with him that I'm just going to continue in the same way.

I've changed the order of certain events for this fic. Apparently the Inter High was held in August and the Tour de France in July. I don't want there to be a year apart, so let's just pretend the Inter High was held in June.

All the Tour de France details are based on the year 2013's race. :)


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3 – Viva la France... or at least the Hotel Rooms**

~o~

Toudou had never been abroad before. The airport of Charles de Gaulle was a little bit of a shock, to put it mildly. Latin alphabets everywhere and language he couldn't understand. The air felt and smelled weird. People were tall. Broad. Big. Imaizumi Shunsuke looked short compared to them. Tadokoro the Human Bullet Train looked like a featherweight. Midousuji Akira would have probably looked like a person of an average height here, that freaking titan.

The next problem was that Toudou couldn't find his bag.

"Everyone else's luggage is here." He waved at the pile of stuff they had collected from the baggage carousel. "Where's my bag?" Panic started to creep into his mind. All of his hygiene products and clothes and headbands were in that bag. Would he need to buy a new set of everything? He was sure that he couldn't find any fitting piece of clothing in this damned city of giants, at least not from the adult selection. He would have to shop for children's clothes! And he had packed his training outfit and his cycling shoes too, and those weren't the cheapest things around!

When there weren't any bags left on the carousel, they had no choice but to proceed to the Lost and Found where nobody spoke English (and definitely not Japanese). Luckily it turned out that Mr. Pierre actually knew his French.

"They're trying to track where your bag might have gone to. For now we can do nothing but wait."

Toudou felt like throwing himself to the ground to bawl and pound the floor with his fists like a little kid. "Why only my bag? Why is everyone else's stuff here?"

"It's an honest mistake." Mr. Pierre shrugged. The old man looked way too happy for Toudou's taste, but then again, his bag was safely in the hands of Sohoku's captain. "They have my number and they'll let us know immediately when they have tracked your bag and when it can be delivered."

"They'll probably find it in the next 24 hours and you'll get it back before we leave Paris," said Manami, trying to make him feel better and not succeeding very much.

"But what if they can't find it in time, and we drive to Foug… Fug… to that 12th stage and they can't deliver my bag there? How are they going to track us if we switch locations along with the Tour?"

Arakita let out a frustrated huff. "Will you not weep over one single bag?"

"You'd weep too if it was your bag that was missing – and your uncensored porn!"

"My computer was in my hand luggage for a good reason."

"It's the flight company's duty to deliver luggage to its owner," Fuku said. "They'll ship it to any part of the world if necessary. But like Manami said, it's very probable that your bag will be here before we take our leave."

"Great. Can we finally go to the hotel now? I'm starting to get hungry," Sohoku's human-bull grunted.

Toudou caved in. Not like he had any other choice. Besides, he was hungry too, tired in a way he'd never experienced, and in serious need of a shower. Except that all his cosmetics were in the missing bag. He hoped that their hotel was one of those that provided shower gel and shampoo samples for their customers.

Their bus was driving on the wrong side of the road. Toudou kept turning his head from side to side, trying to see if anyone else had noticed. Then he remembered. Right-hand traffic. Man, he was glad he hadn't opened his mouth.

It was early night in Paris. The Eiffel Tower shone above the city in its nightly illumination. Everything was yellow, white or golden in the glow of the street lights. No colourful advertisements or neon lights. Here and there they could see muddy red or wooden gateways, a couple of coloured awnings, but mostly the view was like something out of a faded post card. Then their bus turned to a street where red and blue signs were advertising pizza and kebab and the façade became somewhat shabbier. It seemed that in Europe colourfulness indicated an area of not so well-off people. Toudou was relieved that they didn't stop on that street.

"Hey Fuku, our hotel is, like, normal quality, right?"

"It's a three-star hotel. Nothing too luxurious but it should do fine for this lot."

That could mean almost anything. Toudou had heard that in Europe accommodations with fewer stars were in fact suspicious crummy holes that a person living in Japan couldn't even begin to imagine. This could be the _only_ chance of the whole trip to spend a night in a hotel so he certainly hoped it was up to par. Seriously, if Fuku had booked them in a scabby whore motel, Toudou would collect his remaining luggage and check himself into another accommodation immediately. And he'd take Maki-chan with him.

That reminded him of how they'd share the rooms.

It was a widely known fact that after travelling 13 hours and being served inedible food, and when everyone was sporting a serious case of jet lag, sorting out the sleeping quarters could easily fire up arguments. Therefore the captains had decided to devise the sleeping arrangements beforehand in a written form. This was what they had come up with:

Room 1: Fukutomi, Shinkai and Arakita

Room 2: Toudou, Izumida and Manami

Room 3: Kinjou, Tadokoro and Makishima

Room 4: Teshima and Aoyagi

Room 5: Imaizumi, Naruko and Onoda

Toudou had very little desire to sleep in the same room with a weirdo who talked to his pecs (Izumida chatted with Andy and Frank in his sleep and sometimes emitted his abs-related battle cries – it wasn't something you wanted to wake up to) and a vaguely human-shaped fairy. Although, Manami did have two habits that reduced his irksomeness as a roommate: first, he tended to vanish without any notice, usually to cycle, and second, because of his undiagnosed narcolepsy the brat slept most of the time he didn't spend on cycling. But those times when he was awake and in the close vicinity his babbling was really incomprehensible and it made listeners want to rip their ears off.

Besides, Toudou wanted to share his room with Maki-chan.

"Fuku, give me those sleeping arrangements," he urged. "I'll change them a bit."

The answer came from several mouths. "No way!"

"Hey, I can guarantee everyone will be happy!"

Fuku stayed adamant. "I'm not giving that paper to you, Toudou."

"Okay, I'll just write my own arrangements on another piece of paper, and if it gets more votes than your lame ass list, it will become valid."

Nobody commented on that which Toudou took as a sign of approval. He took a notebook and a pen out of his bag and started sketching. Oddly enough, his travelling companions didn't seem interested or give him suggestions. Maybe the guys trusted his judgment after all.

After finishing his scribble, he cleared his throat to get everyone's attention. "Okay, hear me out. Room 1: Me and Maki-chan. Room 2: Fuku, Arakita and Hayato. Room 3: Izumida, Manami and Onoda. Room 4: Kinjou, Teshima, the bul– Tadokoro and Mr. Pierre. Room 5: Imaizumi, Naruko and Aoyagi."

"Mr. Pierre has got his own room. It's not part of the arrangements," Kinjou told him.

"Me and Hajime are sleeping in the same room," Teshima said.

"I'm not going to share a room with you," said Maki-chan.

"What, why not? We're going to have an extraordinary amount of fun!"

"You will keep that extraordinary fun of yours down so that your next door neighbours can sleep," Arakita said.

"Your list is no good, Jinpachi," Shinkai noted. "Let's just stick to the one Juichi and Kinjou made."

"Easy for you to say, you're not teamed up with a sleep biker and Prince Oberon!" Aargh, those ungrateful blockheads! Toudou flipped the paper over, starting to outline a new plan. Apparently they had booked only one double room, and that one he was going to pre-empt for himself and Maki-chan. The other rooms had to have three occupants. Excluding Mr. Pierre made the task slightly easier.

In the end he shoved his plan in Fuku's hand. "There. It should be passable now."

Fuku's lips moved silently as he read Toudou's list. He hmph'd before giving his verdict. "Looks alright to me, but I'm not sure if Sohoku agrees."

"Come on, it's just one night. You should be able to endure it even if you had to sleep in a bathtub."

"Exactly. You should be able to endure sharing a room with the sleep bik– Izumida and Manami."

"Let me see that paper." Tadokoro rose to his feet and snatched the paper from Fuku's hand. "Hmm, okay, okay… Kinjou, do you mind sharing a room with Imaizumi and Naruko?"

"No, that's fine."

"Then I see no problem here. Onoda, you get to share a room with Manami. For me this is as good as the first plan."

Makishima's defeated voice came from somewhere between the seats. "Toudou has placed me in the same room with him again, hasn't he?"

"Yeah, that's right. But really, maybe you shouldn't anger your girlfrie–"

"Hey!"

"HEY!"

Arakita laughed way too hard for Toudou's liking.

"Shut up, you lecher. You watch porn in public!"

Arakita raised his finger, looking very self-important. "_Hetero_ porn."

The problem with Arakita was that he never got embarrassed. If someone pulled his pants down in the middle of a busy street, he would only pull them back up (and kick the trickster's ass). There wasn't even the faintest blush on his face. Huffing in frustration, Toudou sank back into his seat.

"I don't really mind, we can act according to your list," Fuku promised. "If nobody feels like complaining?"

This time Maki-chan didn't say anything. Toudou felt his mood starting to elevate again.

* * *

"You truly are one hell of a moron."

Those weren't exactly the words Toudou had expected to hear from Maki-chan when they had finally got to the hotel and their room.

"What, why?"

"Was it really necessary to cause such a scene over a single night?"

"What are you talking about, Maki-chan? Of course it was necessary. First of all, that original list was a product of utter dictatorship and I was going to end up…"

"Toudou, shut up."

Something in his opponent's voice made Toudou fall silent. Maki-chan was looking at him through his green bangs, the corners of his mouth twitching upwards.

"You're a moron but this was an admissible stunt." Twitching deepened into a smile. This time it was genuine and didn't give Toudou goose bumps. "You probably noticed that all the other rooms were for three people."

"Yeah, I did."

"And perhaps you are aware that in hotels there are very rarely rooms that are actually made for three people. There are usually only rooms for two and four people. A three-person room stands for..."

"An extra bed!" Toudou lifted his hand and Maki-chan gave him a high five. "Don't I always say that I'm blessed with eye-caressing looks and amazing skills of articulation?"

"You do, but it has nothing to do with this." Maki-chan dropped his bag on the floor and sat down on one of the beds. Toudou was about to do the same thing but then he remembered the state of his luggage. He only had a backpack which contained some entertainment for the trip, his cell and wallet.

Instead of slumping down onto the bed, he went to check the bathroom. A super tiny booth but it had towels and shampoo bottles. He would be able to take a shower. The only problem was that he'd planned to change his clothes too, because after sitting on a plane for 13 hours nobody was at their freshest.

"Man, I really hope my bag will get here by tomorrow."

"Those clothes will do for tomorrow, you know."

Toudou pushed himself off of the bathroom door frame. "Maki-chan, did you just meet me? No, these will not do for tomorrow. They are wrinkled, worn-out, and…" _Smelly?_ No, he never smelled. Not even after the hardest, longest, sweatiest climb.

"Passable?"

"No! I have a reputation to maintain. What would people say if I wandered around Paris wearing my travelling clothes?" It wouldn't speed up his Losing My Virginity project, that's for sure. Weren't French people, like, insanely fixated with their appearance?

"Nobody would say anything?"

Toudou felt like screaming. Just how thick-headed people could be?

"Listen," Maki-chan said, taking a more serious tone. "If your bag doesn't make it here by tomorrow, I'll lend you some clothes. Not that I have that many sets of clothes with me but you can have one pair of trousers and a shirt. And naturally you can buy new clothes here."

Toudou was almost moved by this generosity. He scurried to the bed, spreading his arms out to hug his saviour. "Maki-chan!"

Unfortunately, Maki-chan was allergic to any sort of touching apart from a quick slap of hands. He leaned away and pushed his elbows up in front so that Toudou couldn't get in the close vicinity. "I mean, if you accept my clothes. I don't know if our tastes are that similar…"

Maki-chan wore colours that Toudou couldn't picture on himself, but his clothes weren't _that_ bad. Toudou could wear them for a day. At least they were clean.

"But we can talk about that in the morning," Maki-chan added. "Now I'm planning to eat and go to sleep after that."

"Hmm." It was only 7 pm in Paris but everyone was tired from travelling. Toudou had never experienced jet lag, and he'd heard it was worse when travelling towards the east but he could already feel the symptoms creeping on him. His inner clock was ticking the wee hours. Lights seemed a bit too bright, thoughts took turns in crawling and bouncing around and his stomach hinted some near-future problems. Tomorrow they'd probably feel like staying in bed even if travelling guides advised to blend in the local way of living, so that their bodies would adapt soon.

Still, Toudou had had it in mind to chat before going to bed. Who knew when he'd get a chance to talk privately with Maki-chan again?

"So, a French sandwich. Let's have a taste then." Maki-chan pulled a stuffed half of baguette out of a plastic bag, biting its end. "Mhm, this is good."

"It is?" After the plane food Toudou was suspicious when it came to the local food but Maki-chan's sandwich looked and smelled appealing. He'd bought himself an almost similar sandwich but instead of ham it was filled with chicken. He sat down onto the other bed and grabbed his own snack, unwrapping it and taking a bite. While chewing, he mused over the taste. Nothing revolutionary but it was pretty good especially when you were hungry.

They ate in silence, because not even Toudou had a tendency to talk with his mouth full, at least not that often. After eating, exhaustion attacked him with a renewed power. He'd have to get in the shower right away if he wished to make it through without falling asleep.

"Can I take a shower first, Maki-chan?"

"Be my guest."

He'd have to wear his travelling clothes after the shower, too. There weren't even bathrobes in the bathroom. What kind of a three-star hotel was this supposed to be?

Perhaps Maki-chan sensed his hesitation, perhaps he just happened to think the same, but he asked whether Toudou already wanted to borrow a shirt from him.

"Yes, please. I have nothing clean with me, Maki-chan." Not even underwear. Would he have to sleep buttnaked? He did that sometimes at home, but he was always alone then. What if he kicked blankets aside in his sleep and Maki-chan saw him half-naked?

It shouldn't have mattered, they were both part of a sport team and were used to seeing naked guys around, but a bare ass peeking out from under a blanket was in its vulgarity something that _Arakita_ would do – not Toudou.

"Sorry Toudou, but I really don't feel like lending you my underwear."

Toudou jerked. Had he thought out loud? "I don't want your underwear!"

"Okay, good. As long as we agree." Maki-chan wore a strange expression on him, something Toudou couldn't really interpret. The green-haired climber opened the zipper of his bag and rummaged through it just to pull out a white tee shirt with an image of a deer in its front. Toudou accepted the offered piece of clothing and strode in the bathroom to scrub himself clean.

As he returned, Maki-chan was already lying on his bed, looking like he had no intention of taking a shower. When Toudou mentioned it, Maki-chan said he'd save it until the morning. It was only one night, who cared about their level of dirtiness anyway?

"What kind of sleeper are you?" Toudou asked, towelling his hair. "You don't snore or talk in your sleep, do you?"

Maki-chan turned to face him slowly. He looked very tired. He'd pulled the blanket all the way up to his chin, his hair had spread on the pillow like a green fan, and his heavy eyelids were resting on blue irises. "Toudou, this was your idea. You will suffer through it, even if I had a tendency to _roar_ in my sleep."

"Yeah but… you don't really do that, right? I'm a very light sleeper."

"Not that I'm aware of, no."

"But are you sure?"

"I'm kind of convinced that my parents would have gotten me help if I actually shouted in my sleep."

"Your house is so big that sound doesn't carry to its other end."

Maki-chan snorted and closed his eyes. "Good night, Toudou. Please turn off the lights when you're done."

"I was thinking we'd chat for a bit." The shower had refreshed him so that he still felt like staying awake for a while.

"No, we're going to sleep now. If you can't stay quiet, I'll throw you into the hallway."

"Jeez, what a party pooper," Toudou muttered, but Maki-chan turned his back on him and pretended to go to sleep. Maybe he should get under the blankets too. Tomorrow was going to be a long day. First they would go and see as much of Paris as they could, and then in the afternoon they'd drive to Foug… well, that place anyway.

Toudou knew that sleeping with wet hair only resulted in a horrible case of bed head, but he ended up spreading a hand towel over his pillow to protect it from getting wet and padded across the room to turn off the lights. There was a dim glow coming from the street, shining through the curtains, so he didn't trip on his way back to his bed. The mattress was softer than he was used to, and the pillow was no more than a bag of fluff. His head sank into it so deep that there was a serious risk of suffocating. For a long time, he sought a comfortable position but in the end he just threw the pillow aside and folded a bedspread underneath his head. It wasn't very comfortable either but at least it supported his neck.

"Good night, Maki-chan," he said, but his roommate didn't reply.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4 – Shinkai saves the night**

~o~

The hotel rooms were okay. Nothing luxurious, more like a decayed frame covered with new wallpapers and sheathing. But the sheets looked washed and the room smelled like someone had cleaned there. That was enough for Shinkai. He lowered his bag onto the bed closest to the door.

Here was the thing: the hotel had only very few actual three-person rooms and Sohoku's captain along with two first-years had snatched the only one that had been available. Others had to settle for two normal beds and one spare bed, the quality of which could be anything between a normal bunk and a cot. In this room it was a camp bed.

The biggest question was who would sleep in the unsteady, squeaky iron monster. Shinkai wouldn't have been the first person to jam the captain in it, but if the other choice was Yasutomo or himself…

Yasutomo had an opinion on the matter already. "Fuck you, Shinkai. Who promised you that bed?"

"I dropped my bag on it."

"I'm taking this one." Yasutomo marched to the other bed and made a big show of shoving his own bag on it.

"Are you seriously going to force Juichi into that thing?" Shinkai pointed at the camp bed that was squeezed between the actual beds. Sure, it was covered with a mattress, blankets and sheets but its true identity shone through loud and clear. The center had collapsed and its width was only half of that of a regular bed.

In other words, they had two regular beds and a _hole_.

"Surely Fuku-chan can fit himself in it."

Yeah, he probably could fit alright but was it appropriate? No matter how hard Shinkai tried, he just couldn't picture their stoic ace sunken in the depths of a creaking cot.

"Where do I fit?" asked the individual in question. Juichi was the last one to enter their room.

Yasutomo waved in the direction of their sleeping quarters. "In that middle bed."

Juichi walked closer and eyed the arrangement with a deep wrinkle between his brows.

"I can take it," Shinkai heard himself say. It was only one night. If the thing started to hurt his back, he'd just move onto the floor.

"No, I can take it," Juichi said.

For some reason this was not okay with Yasutomo. "Shinkai will take it."

Shinkai turned to look at his teammate. "You just said that Juichi would fit in it."

"Sure he would but I just can't picture him in a narrow camp bed. It would break my world view. You sleep in it."

Shinkai tilted his head. "You don't suppose you can picture yourself in it?"

Yasutomo pretended to think. "Hmm, not really."

And so it was settled. When it was time to go to bed, Shinkai laid down on the squeaky piece of iron junk that felt like any sudden movement would jerk it over if it hadn't been supported on each side by a firm bed frame. It was really hard to find a comfortable position in it. His back sunk deeper than his shoulders and his ass was practically lying in a hole. It was totally impossible to sleep on your side, let alone on your stomach.

"Shall we check what the French TV has to offer?" Yasutomo asked, already clicking the remote.

"My wild guess is that there's nothing in Japanese."

"I can understand English," Yasutomo claimed. That was probably a lie.

"I don't think there's anything in English either," Juichi said. He just stepped out of the bathroom and turned off the lights. They were left with a nightstand lamp lighting the room along with the TV screen. Yasutomo channel surfed. A talk show, some sports – only the wrong kind (football) – another talk show, some kind of action movie. Yasutomo left that on. The movie was both dubbed and subbed in French.

"Don't they know their own language, or why the hell are they subbing movies?" he grumbled.

"Maybe there are a lot of people with hearing disabilities in France."

Shinkai fumbled next to his pillow to find his phone and scanned over his received messages. The device had found a working connection but using it was probably outrageously expensive. Keeping that in mind, he had told his folks back at home as well as Ayane that he'd only send a few texts from his trip. He'd promised to let them know when he was in France and hadn't really had a chance to do it yet.

Ayane, on the other hand, had remembered him with several messages.

'_Hayato, are you in France already?'_

'_Oi, your plane should have landed hours ago. Everything alright?'_

'_Hayato, call me ASAP!'_

'_I'm really starting to get worried here. Call me, will you?'_

He wouldn't have noticed that he had sighed if Yasutomo hadn't glanced at him questioningly. He raised his phone to indicate that it was time to give his family a status report.

He couldn't call Ayane even if she demanded it. His phone was constantly picking up new fields, and he had no idea via which operator his calls would be directed. They were meant to use a borrowed cell that had a French mobile subscription, but a couple of messages would hardly cause a huge bill.

'_Sorry, I didn't get a chance to text you sooner. We've just arrived at the hotel. It was a really long day. Jinpachi's bag got lost and we had to report it at the airport.'_

His phone beeped almost instantly even though according to his calculations it was already way past midnight in Japan.

'_Is everything OK now? What's the hotel like? Who are your roommates?'_

'_Yeah, everything's fine. We're just tired and just going to bed. I'll to try text you at some point along the way but it must be expensive as hell. The hotel's alright.'_

He didn't mention that he had to sleep in a camp bed because Ayane would have clung to it. After sending his message he remembered that he had forgotten to list his roommates. Phew, he needed to send another message.

'_And I'm with Juichi and Yasutomo, as usual.' _When they were on race trips he always shared a room with these two guys (when they all didn't sleep in the same room which also happened surprisingly often). Juichi he knew from middle school. Yasutomo he'd got to know in the cycling club after he'd joined, and for some reason they had hit it off pretty soon – insofar as it was possible with Yasutomo, since he was, at his best, as friendly as a riled up fighting dog. Jinpachi had once analyzed that the connection arose from the fact that Shinkai refused to be provoked by almost anything and that he emitted this sublime aura of serenity, whatever that was supposed to mean.

As his cell beeped again, the crosspatch in question turned to look at Shinkai through his narrowed lids as to tell him he was making too much noise. Shinkai opened the message and huffed in relief.

'_Okay, talk to you later. Good night and have a nice holiday!'_

Of course Ayane understood that the situation was completely exceptional and he couldn't text her all the time. He typed one more message to answer the good night wish and then moved on to text to his mom. She had promised to take care of Usakichi and he wanted to hear how the bunny was doing.

Surprisingly Mom was awake too and he got his answer almost instantly.

'_Your bunny is fine. Yuuto fed him and let him run around a bit in your room.'_

He just hoped that his little bro wouldn't let the bunny nibble any cords. He typed a good night wish for his family as well before muting the phone and placing it next to his head where it immediately slipped underneath his pillow.

On TV there was some kind of car chase going on.

"Nicolas Cage," Yasutomo muttered. "I've seen this."

"Is it any good?"

"I can't remember. I doubt it. They're all the same."

The movie was quite easy to follow until the action scene ended and characters started blathering. Hoping to fall asleep, Shinkai turned to his side out of sheer habit but his spine twisted painfully and he had to return to his back. Even straightening his leg or lifting his hand to rest on his stomach made the bed shake. Shit, it was uncomfortable. Why hadn't the staff simply positioned a mattress on the floor? Maybe it was a seriously downgrading thing to do in Europe; after all they didn't even take their shoes off indoors. The floor was covered with a wall-to-wall carpet that showed signs of back and forth traipsing. Shinkai failed to understand. Wouldn't a stone or wooden floor have been easier to keep clean? After minutes rustling and adjusting he believed to have found a position he could sleep in and pulled the blanket up to his chin. The glow of the screen was flickering on his closed lids but it wasn't the first time he'd fall asleep to TV's sound.

He didn't recall dozing off – he'd been drifting between sleep and awakeness for a long while – but suddenly he felt himself yanked to alertness as somebody poked him in the shoulder. After his senses started working again, he realized that the room was dark even though he didn't remember anyone turning off the TV. He'd probably been asleep then.

The bullying continued. A jab. A poke. And then a hiss. "Shinkai, god damn it!"

Lifting his chin, he peeked towards the disturbing noise and was met with Yasutomo's face. He couldn't see very well in the dark, but his teammate looked angry. Shinkai weighed Yasutomo's state of mind and came to the conclusion that he wasn't asleep. "What is it?"

"Could you finally stop that squeaking and creaking? Not even the dead could sleep here."

Shinkai shrugged and immediately the bed let out a relevant noise. "What can you do? I can't even move a muscle without making the bed shake."

"But what the bloody hell are you doing? A sleeping person shouldn't move all the time. Are you trying to jerk off without us noticing? Because I can tell you it's not working!"

"I am trying to _sleep_. Unfortunately I need to breathe too while sleeping and if that makes the springs grate, there's not much I can do about it."

"Breathe like normal people! You don't need the full capacity of your lungs to do it."

"Shall we switch? Let's see if you can sleep in this without making noise."

Yasutomo snorted. "Like hell we're gonna switch."

"Then you just have to take it like a man."

At that point Juichi joined the conversation. "I don't know what you guys are going to do, but I suggest you do it soon so that other people can sleep."

Yasutomo huffed in defeat. "Fucking hell... Just get in here."

Shinkai blinked, surprised. "Where?"

"This bed can easily hold two people. It's designed for gaijin giants anyway."

So… Yasutomo suggested they'd sleep together in the same bed? He'd sleep in the same bed with his teammate. A teammate who was male too. Wasn't that a bit..?

Shinkai stopped his train of thoughts. He was tired and he wanted to go to sleep as soon as possible. Never mind who was sleeping next to him; the most important thing was to quieten down the room. Besides, on this holiday they couldn't afford to be picky about sleeping quarters. Even so, he failed to picture how 14 almost adult-sized males would be able to bunk in a minivan but maybe they'd spend some of their nights at places where setting up tents was allowed.

"Fine by me," he mumbled, struggling to sit up. He threw his bedclothes onto Yasutomo's bed (and hit him in the face with a pillow, purposely), picked his phone and crawled out of the crater formed in the cot. In the otherwise quiet hotel, the creaking was piercing.

He took the outer side of the bed, leaving Yasutomo closer to Juichi. It took them a moment to arrange all the blankets and pillows so that everything would fit on the mattress but eventually the rustling ceased and peace fell in the room. Shinkai rolled onto his side his back towards his teammate, sinking his head into the pillow. The bed felt divine underneath him: firm yet soft, smooth and supportive. Maybe they would finally get some sleep.

* * *

"Have you ever considered letting someone fuck you?"

_Wha–?_

_What?_

For the second time that night, Shinkai snapped into consciousness abruptly. His heart was beating a little too fast, telling him that the awakening had not been a natural one; that something external had yanked him out of his dream. His lids were stuck together, and he had to rub them before he was able to make some sense of the room. He was greeted by a dark grey wall, an edge of a nightstand and outlines of a lamp. He must have been in a more superficial sleep, otherwise he wouldn't have heard the words, but now he wasn't sure whether they had been said in the first place. The room was silent. There was only the faint breathing of his roommates and the occasional rumbling of the traffic from the street below.

Maybe he'd just dreamt it. But damn, wouldn't that be one weird-ass dream!

He rolled onto his back, turning his head towards his sleeping mate. "Yasutomo?"

Yasutomo was laying his face towards him but absolutely quiet, his eyes closed and lips slightly parted. His deep breathing made his side rise and fall. Behind him Shinkai could make out Juichi's figure. Both were sleeping soundly. He hadn't expected anything else with the captain; the voice had sounded like Yasutomo. But why the hell would Yasutomo ask him something like that?

Maybe he had talked in his sleep. Dreamt about a girl or something. If he watched porn every spare minute, it wouldn't be a surprise if part of it interfered with his dreams, too. Shinkai sighed, turning his back to his teammate again. He fumbled on the nightstand for his phone which he had already changed to France time. It was fifteen past three. The morning was still several hours away. It was already morning in Japan, if he had counted correctly. He should still sleep to reset his inner clock. Placing the phone back on the nightstand, he closed his eyes and forced his thoughts to stop wandering around.

All in all, the night wasn't very restful. Just when, after trying for god knows how long, Shinkai was finally drifting back to sleep, Juichi got up to pop in the toilet. Only a moment after his return Yasutomo did the same thing, and because he didn't want to climb over Shinkai, he had to crawl across the camp bed, filling the room with hellish creaking. Their brain announced that it was morning but everyone still settled down, not saying a word and trying to catch some shut-eye, but right after their room quietened down, the bathroom carousel started behind the wall. Since the soundproofing was close to nothing, every flushing of the toilet carried through the wall. Someone dropped the seat's porcelain lid. A door was closed too hard. Then a siren started to howl in the street. Shinkai heard Yasutomo swearing under his breath.

They dozed until seven when Shinkai was finally getting sleepy again and could actually imagine getting back into deep sleep, but his roommates decided they had weltered in the sheets enough for that night.

Juichi was the first to get up, and judging by the speed that the bed swayed under Shinkai, Yasutomo had only been waiting for a sign to get out of his dull trap. Funny, it was usually him who threatened to rip the head off of anyone daring to wake him up. Their circadian rhythm was a complete mess. The traipsing into bathroom and back started again. First to go was Yasutomo, dragging his feet across the floor and pissing like a race horse into the bowl. Juichi repeated the whole ordeal. Both of them flushed the toilet separately. Yasutomo came to search for his toothbrush and retreated back to the bathroom. As he returned, it was Juichi's turn again. Zippers were pulled and stuff rummaged through. Yasutomo sat on the edge of the bed and Shinkai had to yank his toes out of the way. The two early birds got dressed which also needed to be done extremely noisily, huffing and puffing, as if the clothes had shrunken in the bag. After that the Hakogaku's leading duo had apparently woken up enough to start talking.

"At what time do they serve breakfast?" Yasutomo asked. "Doesn't it usually start at seven already?"

"From seven till eleven. We can go in a minute. I'll just go and check if the others have woken up."

"We're not waiting for Manami."

Juichi left the room. The door clunked shut. Shinkai was lying with his eyes closed and the blanket over his ears, hoping that the others would be asleep and he'd have a chance to doze off for a moment. Yasutomo was still sitting on the bed, his weight pressing down on the mattress. Then Shinkai both heard and _felt_ his teammate turn towards him. Goodbye, dozing.

"Shinkai, get up."

"Mmhm. I'm going to sleep for another hour."

"No, you are not. We are going to have breakfast and then see the city. We have a lot of places to visit."

"No attraction is open at 8 in the morning."

"You reckon someone's asking for tickets by the Seine? There's a ton of sights that you don't have to enter to see them."

"But the other guys were saying that they want…" A yawn ruptured his words. "..want to visit the Eiffel Tower and Notre-Dame and Louvre and some kind of torture museum."

"Who wants to visit Louvre?"

"Umm… don't remember, someone said so."

"Toudou, probably. He can go and gawk at mouldy paintings alone. The rest of us can go to the Eiffel."

It sounded like the trip had messed up more than just Yasutomo's inner clock. He wasn't usually that interested in sightseeing. On the other hand, Shinkai had never been with him in a place with something special to see. He rubbed his eyes, yawning again. Alright, maybe he should get up then. He was already wide awake anyway.

He crawled out of the sheets to sit up and realized that he'd sweated like a pig. It wasn't exactly hot in the room but the blanket felt like it was filled with down. What kind of a crazy person used a duvet during summer? He really needed to shower.

He bent down to dig his bag of toiletries, a new set of clothes and a towel out of his bag. It had been a bad night, through and through. Constant waking and blurred, superficial sleep which had zero refreshing effects. And then there had been that…

He lifted his head to look at his black-haired friend.

"Did you say something to me in the night?"

Yasutomo was quiet for a few seconds, a touch too long, his face frozen. Then he tossed his head back, snorting. "I probably told you to move closer to the edge because you were trying to hog the whole bed."

Huh, Shinkai was pretty sure that he had stayed on his own side the whole night. He wasn't generally the type to roll around in his sleep. Perhaps he'd just imagined it then – sometimes you thought that you heard noises even when it was only a dream. Or it was also possible that Yasutomo had had a dream and parts of it had leaked through.

Shinkai shrugged and collected his stuff before pulling himself to his feet. "I'll take a quick shower. We can go after that."

If Yasutomo said something after that, Shinkai couldn't make it out.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5 – Fifteen men and twelve seats  
**

~o~

The day became hot and sunny. Hectic. Tiring. Laborious. Someone could have called it a survival camp. Going around Paris in half a day was a challenge that left everyone's feet and nerves begging for mercy. Around half past four the troop of drained Japanese tourists wandered to their last destination of the Paris day: a restaurant.

"Shouldn't holidays be refreshing?" Naruko complained after they had settled at a table. They had first planned to walk around as one group but the limited amount of time had scattered them after the Eiffel Tower. Some of them had visited Notre-Dame, some Arc de Triomphe and some had gone to roam around Montmartre.

Makishima was glad that he hadn't been in the same group as Naruko or Arakita, since they seemed to be the worst travelling mates ever, but Tadokoro had also protested some of the historical attractions which didn't obviously have anything to do with food. At the restaurant everyone was sitting amongst their own, Sohoku taking the other half of the table and Hakogaku the other. It was Toudou's and Manami's job to act as a bridge between the two teams and, as it appeared, neither of them seemed to mind. Toudou even inched his chair closer to Makishima, away from Izumida sitting on his other side.

"I don't remember having been this tired even after the Inter High," Naruko added.

"A city holiday is not a real holiday," Toudou pointed out. "But next time you should come to my family's ryokan to experience what relaxing really means."

"Maybe I will. You'd give me a discount, right?"

"If you come with Maki-chan."

Naruko stared at Toudou, flabbergasted as if he was trying to put together two pieces of a puzzle with no logical solution. Then he shook his head and lifted the menu in front of his face. After five seconds, he slammed it back down on the table. "I can't read this. Why aren't there any pictures?"

Everyone else was pretty much facing the same problem. Makishima understood a couple of words from the menu. He hadn't lied to Toudou: he didn't know French but he had memorized some food names back at home. He was able to find chicken and meat dishes, and the next page contained seafood dishes, but that was where his French skills ended. Mr. Pierre sat at the end of the table but it wasn't really very practical for him to roam around the table and translate the menu for fourteen clueless souls. A waitress was eyeing their group looking like she seriously hoped her shift would be over before they'd be ready to order.

Then Shinkai pulled out a pocket dictionary and immediately became the most popular member of the group, at least amongst those who didn't sit next to Mr. Pierre.

"Shinkai, what is… _Poêlée... d'escargots_?"

"What about _Foie gras_?"

"_Moules à la Mariniere_?"

"Which of these are seafood?"

"Hold on, I'm trying to translate one dish at a time!" The pages of the dictionary were rustling, as Shinkai hunted for words with hats and accent marks. "Alright, here's the first one. _Escargots_ means snails."

"Yuck, I don't want that," decided Naruko. "Which one is chicken?"

"Check that Foie-whatever first!" Toudou urged.

"Hmm, that's goose liver."

"Really? Shouldn't that be crazy expensive? Am I converting euros wrong again..?"

"If you're not ordering it, just move on to the next dish," Arakita grunted. "Does somebody want goose liver? No? Okay, next."

"_Moules_ means clams."

"Hmm, I wonder if it's good."

"Hey, which one is chicken?"

"Read faster, Shinkai, or give the book to someone who knows how to use it!"

A small-scale riot was about to take place at the table, the target being Hakogaku's red-headed sprinter and his brand new dictionary, but then Fukutomi rose to his feet, clearing his throat. Everyone shut their mouths and fixed their gazes at the blond man.

"We'll get our order sooner if we all have the same dish," he said. "Would roasted chicken do alright for everyone?"

There was a chorus of approval and the captain of Hakogaku was already sitting down again but then someone dared to disagree.

"I want seafood."

Everyone turned to look at the problem child who this time happened to answer to the name Toudou Jinpachi. Makishima made sure that his gaze was especially stern since he knew that Toudou was constantly aware of his facial expressions.

At first Toudou seemed to sink down into his seat, embarrassed, but soon his true nature took over and he started spreading his arms extravagantly. "The French cuisine is famous for its seafood. Shouldn't we taste it now when we have a chance?"

"Just take the chicken," Arakita huffed. "You can have seafood next time."

Toudou looked like he wanted to start arguing about the matter but everyone, including Mr. Pierre, was glaring at him so fiercely that he had to raise his hands in defeat.

"So, chicken for everyone."

The waitress summoned up enough courage to approach their table when Mr. Pierre asked with his fluent French and seemed relieved to scribble such a simple order into her notebook.

While waiting for their actual meals, they nibbled bread and compared the results of their sightseeing tours. Onoda had found a shop that sold manga translated in French and had actually bought a couple of books. At the moment he was very eager to show them to Manami sitting next to him, which luckily spared Imaizumi and Makishima from the torture. Manami even seemed to be politely interested in the babblings of Sohoku's otaku-child. Imaizumi was trying to concentrate on his phone but Naruko kept bothering him, wanting to show off photos that he'd taken – which, judging by his flushed cheeks and glimmering eyes, were all about bicycles.

Toudou had followed Makishima to the tour at Montmartre where they had first visited the basilica of Sacré-Coeur and after that had intended to proceed to the near-by cemetery when they had come across a museum of eroticism. No one had exactly suggested that they should enter it but after a few minutes of hesitation they had found themselves inside, gawking at art that back at home would never have been displayed publicly. What made it even funnier, was the fact that also Kinjou and Tadokoro had been part of their group. Makishima had to admit he had enjoyed the tour immensely especially because Toudou had been _so thoroughly embarrassed_. He had never seen Toudou Jinpachi that quiet and that was something to mark the day down as a historical milestone. Kinjou had eyed the items through his glasses, his appearance cool and collected as usual, but Tadokoro had emitted such loud and rude noises that the staff had thrown disapproving gazes in their direction.

"So, what is your first impression of Paris?" Izumida asked his teammates. He'd been a part of the troupe that had visited Arc de Triomphe.

"A lot of tourists and even more to see," Toudou said. "People don't seem very polite, though."

"You were the one saying _merde_ to salespersons when you were supposed to say _merci_," Makishima remarked, making everyone in the close vicinity laugh.

"I spent my flight listening to Arakita chant _merde_ over and over again, what else can you expect?" Toudou defended himself, trying to keep any redness from sneaking up to his face.

"You wanna tell everyone how in the museum of eroticism you first thought those paintings were illustrations for children's books?"

"The museum of eroticism?" Suddenly the whole table was alert (apart from Mr. Pierre who had sunken into his own world and Kinjou who pretended that he hadn't heard) even though Makishima thought he hadn't spoken that loud.

"I wasn't the only one. The bull thought so too!"

"No, I didn't! And don't call me a bull, Barbie!"

In fact, even Makishima had first thought that the paintings had accidentally been hung up in the wrong museum but another glance had shaken off the misconception.

Arakita was gaping. "There's a museum of eroticism here? And we went to some musty, old church!"

"That 'musty, old church' happens to be the most famous cathedral of Europe. Besides, you're the one who wanted to go there," Shinkai pointed out.

"That was before I heard about the museum of eroticism. Fuck, what did they have in there?"

"Well..." Toudou began, pride seeping through his voice. "This and that."

"Did you take any pictures?"

"Some."

"Gimme your phone." Arakita leaned over Izumida in order to grab Toudou's cell but he lifted it out of reach. "Let me see!"

Toudou shook his finger, looking all self-important. "No porn at the dinner table. I'll show them to you in the car later."

Arakita accepted his fate with a couple of swearwords because at that moment the waitress returned carrying their drinks.

When their dining was reaching its end, Kinjou asked for everyone's attention. Makishima was pretty sure that the captain had strategically timed the bad news at the moment when everyone had their stomachs full and minds relaxed.

"I'd like to say a few words about our transportation," Kinjou began. "The thing is that the van is officially designed for 12 people."

Despite their heavy meal, the group let out a defeated sigh. A car that lacked three seats meant sitting cramped side by side with the other passengers, complaining, sweating and irritated travellers. They couldn't even negotiate over the passenger's seat next to the driver since that was automatically reserved for Kinjou.

"Why can't we rent a camping car?" Naruko dared to protest.

"Our car is not rented," Kinjou said. "It belongs to Mr. Pierre's friend and that's why we are allowed to borrow it in exchange of paying for the gas. Would you like to pay for a camping car?"

Naruko lowered his gaze. "Well, not alone, but I assume that the others would contribute, too."

"It's not safe. A camping car doesn't have enough seatbelts. If the police stopped us, we could get a ticket."

Twelve seats also meant that some of them had to squash themselves in the same belt with another person, which probably didn't look that much better in the eyes of authorities.

"But we could have slept in the car…"

"We have sleeping bags and tents and the seats in the van are detachable, so the car floor can be used as a well. And there are hotels on the way if someone wants to splurge. I assume all the cheap accommodations are fully booked though."

Naruko shut his mouth. Everything was settled anyway and a search for a camping car would waste their precious time. They still had to drive to Fougères that evening.

Kinjou's shades were scanning over the audience. "Does someone still want to complain about our transportation?"

Everyone was quiet. A half-free ride was half-free, even if packed in a bit too tiny space. Besides, the cars were designed for gaijin and none of them could compare to those measures. Except for Tadokoro, perhaps.

They went back to the hotel to collect their stuff while Mr. Pierre fetched the vehicle in question. Toudou's bag had arrived while they had wandered around the city and his mood lifted 110 percent. He would have immediately changed into his own clothes but Makishima stopped him.

"Why would you use several sets of clothes when the chances of washing them are limited? Just wear those for today. It's not like I need them now."

"If you say so, Maki-chan!"

At first it had been weird to see Toudou in the clothes that usually faced him in the mirror – and the others had glanced twice too – but as the day progressed, his eyes had adjusted. Actually his clothes looked pretty good on Toudou, at least the trousers. Toudou filled them better than Makishima who, despite many years of active cycling, still had the legs of a stick man.

"If I'm running short on clothes, I'll ask to borrow yours," he added.

"That's fine! You scratch my back and I'll scratch yours, Maki-chan! I'm in your debt since you saved me from public humiliation. Not in a million years could I have walked through the streets of Paris wearing my scruffy travelling clothes."

Makishima sighed. Where there was Toudou, there was useless drama.

* * *

The car ride turned out to be slightly easier than it had first sounded, but only because Kinjou gave up his right to the front passenger seat. Onoda had a tendency to travel sickness so they would most likely have it easier by placing the boy in the front. Because Onoda was the smallest in size, it would have been a waste for himto sit alone in a single seat which was wider than the rest. Therefore, they had decided to team him up with another passenger. The task fell, without any raffles or polls, to Manami who regarded his duty very meekly.

The next three-seat row held Teshima and Aoyagi, who had to share both the seat and the seatbelt, and also Tadokoro and Kinjou. Makishima knew what was waiting for him and he had already kind of resigned himself to his fate. But he did bargain over his seat a bit so that Toudou sat next to Naruko, that way he could rest his legs on the narrow aisle next to his own seat. The position forced his back against Toudou's shoulder and they had to share a seatbelt but that way they got more space in the row and Imaizumi, crammed between Naruko and the wall, wouldn't throw a fit.

The last row containing four seats was reserved for the rest of Hakogaku's team: Shinkai, Arakita, Fukutomi and Izumida. They had it the easiest, since everyone got their own seat and seatbelt. The noisiest members of Sohoku (Naruko and Tadokoro) let the others hear their opinions, and the protesting ceased only when Kinjou noted that the seating order was not meant to be the same for the whole Tour.

With every soul and luggage safely packed in the car, Mr. Pierre started the engine and drove them out of the capital. He tried to pick a quiet route, taking them to the country side with eye-caressing scenery: cute, little villages, luxuriant meadows and occasional belts of trees. The journey was relatively peaceful until the road started to have more and more curves and potholes which unfortunately did not match well with a fully packed vehicle.

Yet again, the complaining from Naruko started. "Hotshot, stay in your own seat!"

Imaizumi pulled a plug out of his ear and glared at the redhead murderously. "I haven't moved a centimeter. How could I, squeezed between you and the wall?"

"You keep jostling me all the time!"

"The car sways, I can't help it." The plug returned to his ear and Imaizumi turned to look through the window, signalling that he wasn't going to continue the argument.

"This is like a can of sardines," Tadokoro grumbled in front of them. "Kinjou, please give me my sandwich from my bag."

"Oi, grandpa, maybe you shouldn't eat when we're short on space already!"

Tadokoro turned to peek at Naruko between the headrests. "Zip it, brat. Shouldn't be your concern."

"But Teshima-senpai and Aoyagi-senpai will get squashed."

"Don't drag us into your show," Teshima said.

Against his back, Makishima felt Toudou shift his position and then a warm breath tickled his neck. "Your team is kinda noisy, Maki-chan."

"Only two members of the team are noisy, not the whole team."

"Our team is travelling quietly and contently."

"Why do I hear you talking constantly then?"

Just then there was an audible crack of a plastic bottle cap in the back row and immediately after that a whoosh and a patter that could only have come from an over-pressurized soda.

"Motherfucker! God damned French cock-sucking gas drink and below the par shit-hole roads!"

"Hey, you spilled it on me!"

"Don't you start whining now, cry baby! Most of it is in my lap!"

"But it looks like I pissed my pants!"

"You keep those overgrown lips of yours shut and get us some paper towels!"

Makishima sighed inwardly. Did he dare to take a look?

Toudou was already looking on his behalf. And since he couldn't reach over the seats, he inched over Makishima's lap, so that he could peek down the aisle. Makishima protested under his breath, as Toudou was supporting himself on his thigh but Toudou didn't show any signs of noticing his discomfort.

"Tsk tsk, Arakita. You should always open the cap just a little and see if there's too much pressure. Besides, if you drank healthier drinks, these kinds of things wouldn't happen. The sport drinks don't contain gas."

"You can stuff your health advice up your green ass, fucking hippie!"

"Are there any paper towels in this car?" Shinkai asked. He sounded surprisingly calm for a person who had just had half a bottle of Bepsi thrown into his lap and who looked like he'd just 'pissed his pants'.

"Be careful not to stain the interior. It's not our car," Fukutomi said.

"We're trying. Give me that fucking paper already!"

Somebody pulled out a roll of paper towels, and Arakita and Shinkai proceeded to dry themselves. The seats hadn't got splattered, thanks to the tight safety net that their laps had formed, but both Arakita and Shinkai had their clothes soaked in the front and there were still over 200 kilometers to drive. Toudou was watching the show somewhat amused until Makishima verbalized again that his thighs were hurting.

"At least our team members don't use such language," Makishima noted over his shoulder when Toudou was properly seated again.

The other climber flashed him a wide smile. "Nah, Arakita just possesses a tad more extensive vocabulary than the rest of us. He has just extended it in the wrong way."

"Wasn't he living in a box in the streets and earning his living as a prostitute before Fukutomi found him?"

Naruko's remark was too much even for Toudou. His jaw dropped and it took him a good while to search for a comeback, and even then it wasn't really worth mentioning. "_No_, he wasn't!"

Naruko shrugged. "Just something I heard."

"Don't you think for a second that _I_ can't hear what you're saying, you little can of red garbage!" came a response from the back row. "The moment this car stops, I'll give you a demonstration of how I pitched in baseball during my years in middle school. _You_ will have the honour of serving as a ball!"

Naruko laughed at the threat but his face had paled and he shut up quickly after that. The back row finished their drying operation and calmed down, but the sickly sweet smell of warm cola drink started spreading inside the van.

Toudou exhaled and let his head flop against the back of Makishima's neck. Makishima had tried to flick through his travel guide but reading in a car gave him motion sickness too, so he had had to put the book away. For a moment, he tried to lean forward but Toudou's head just kept following him. Well, he could always take advantage of the other boy's touchy feely nature. He moved his weight so that he was in turn resting his head on Toudou's temple. Toudou pulled back a bit, out of sheer surprise, but then anchored his head in an angle where they both could lean against each other without tiring their muscles.

Phew. The fatigue caught them immediately when they stopped moving for a moment. It wasn't very comfortable leaning on Toudou's head, but when Makishima supported himself on the seat too, he could have dozed off. In fact, that sounded more appealing than watching the scenery. The atmosphere in the car grew drowsy; everyone was still more or less suffering from jet lag and the day's sightseeing tour had drained their energy levels. In the back row, Arakita was barking at Shinkai to not spread out in other people's seats but he lacked the spirit too.

"Maki-chan?" Toudou asked in a low voice. Makishima could feel his jaw moving against the back of his head.

"Hmm?"

"If we have to sleep in a tent in that Fou-place, could I and you share one?"

He could have argued just for the heck of it but he was too tired. "I suppose we could."

"Good." Toudou let out a content huff and fell silent again.

In the front, Kinjou turned to look at them. Makishima spotted it out of the corner of his eye. As their eyes briefly met, it felt like the captain's gaze was saying something behind the shades. Like Kinjou wanted to say something but he was hesitating, thinking if it was appropriate. Or maybe he was just asking if Makishima had noticed. Was he aware of the actual nature of the situation?

Yeah. Yeah, he believed he was.

For a long while now he had asked himself if there was something else behind Toudou's interest than the will to compete on climbing. At first he had ignored it as one of those lapses his mind occasionally came up with. Why would Toudou be interested in him? Toudou who wore the crown of Hakogaku's official heartbreaker. Who girls drooled after and who would have gotten anyone he wanted. Toudou who had called him a jewel beetle. Toudou who had said that his smile outshone those of murder clowns of horror movies.

Makishima had told himself not to be stupid. But then Toudou's messaging had started to match the criteria of obsession and harassment, and he had to admit something was going on. What normal rival called and texted their opponent several times a day (and sometimes at night, too)? Kinjou wasn't receiving any messages, let alone Tadokoro. Hell, Tadokoro didn't even know his opponent's name before the Inter High. And Toudou's messages were not always about cycling. Sometimes he talked about the weather, sometimes complained about homework, sometimes just babbled about unnecessary crap, like what he had done that day, and sometimes he wanted to know unthinkable stuff about Makishima (of which the text from two weeks ago was an excellent example). Makishima tried to regard everything objectively: what he would have thought if he hadn't been the one bombarded with texts and phone calls? What if Kinjou had told him that Hakogaku's Fukutomi called him almost every day and the rest of the time kept sending him texts which consisted of everything from holiday plans to Kinjou's eating habits?

Naturally, first they would need to rule out any kind of mental condition, but after that Makishima would have said that Fukutomi had a crush on Kinjou. Yeah. Definitely a crush.

But Toudou? _A crush? On Makishima?_ That was totally unheard of! Sure, sometimes Tadokoro joked that Makishima needed to answer his phone in order to keep his girlfriend satisfied but Makishima had not thought that he was serious. Tadokoro hardly had any idea that there might be a grain of truth in his words.

Instead, it looked like _Kinjou_ had noticed the same thing as Makishima.

If he had to describe the matter in one sentence, Makishima had no idea how to go about it. Maybe it was because he had never been in a similar situation. Maybe it was because they were both guys – and rivals for that matter. Or maybe it was only because Toudou was Toudou.

He had decided not to act on it and just wait. Wait and see when Toudou would… take the initiative step or something. Confess to him. If he just waited and stayed neutral, he wouldn't find himself in that extremely humiliating situation of getting turned down. Toudou could deny everything and tell him that he was imagining things, and that wasn't something Makishima would be ready to face.

He wasn't completely sure but he had a gut feeling. A very strong gut feeling.

But it could very well be that he would still have to wait for a long time.

Because he wasn't sure if Toudou _himself_ had realized.

* * *

A/N: The erotic paintings I referred to were in the Museum of Eroticism in the year 2011 and I don't know about today but I don't think that's very relevant to the plot. :3


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: Thank you Rica S. K. and Maiden Warrior for reviewing! I usually answer personally to everyone who comments but naturally I can't PM them if the person has no account. Anyway I appreciate anyone who leaves a review. :) Unfortunately I can't promise any Imainaru, since I've got my hands full with these two pairings and they are taking a long time. But maybe there will be some hints if you are wearing your yaoi glasses. ;)

* * *

**Chapter 6 – Ogling at pretty "girls"**

~o~

Somewhere after green moors, stone fences, endless fields and farms Mr. Pierre suddenly hit the brakes and turned right. Behind a row of trees they could see a camping area, fully crowded, as expected. Camping cars and caravans crammed side by side, tents, grills, families, groups of youngsters and those who were clearly there only for the Tour.

"We have booked a spot," Kinjou appeased the tired lot. Nobody felt like looking for accommodation at that time in the evening.

Toudou swung his back off of the seat, twisting his neck to see what kind of scene they had arrived to. The camping area was mostly a grass field, but little rows of trees and bushes offered some privacy and – which was the best news of the day – the place was founded by a small lake. Cool, they could go for a night swim!

"How many tents do we have altogether?" he asked Maki-chan who had been nodding off for half of the ride and had only woken up when the car had slowed down.

"It depends how many tents you guys have. We have three."

"We brought three as well. Good, maybe no one has to sleep in the car tonight." He opened his mouth again, about to make sure that Maki-chan wouldn't take back his promise that they'd share a tent, but he restrained his tongue. Maki-chan had already agreed. Pressing it could make him change his mind.

"How do we decide who takes which tent?"

"We have one small and two bigger ones."

"Maybe we…" Toudou hesitated. "Maybe we could take the small one?"

For some reason Maki-chan didn't start arguing. He'd been amazingly compromising the whole day. "If that's okay with the others."

"Do we need to accommodate Mr. Pierre too, or has he booked a hotel room?"

"Do you see a hotel around here? No, he must sleep in a tent – or in the back of the van."

"Maybe Kinjou and Tadokoro will take him?"

"Yeah, maybe."

The car stopped and everyone started unbuckling their seatbelts. Kinjou pulled the side door open and the travellers poured out to stretch their limbs in the fresh air. A two-and-a-half-hour drive in a swaying, fully packed car could be called an ordeal. Luckily nobody had had motion sickness, though at one point Onoda had looked 'suspiciously green'. And luckily the vehicle had air conditioning; otherwise it would have smelled even more like stale Bepsi.

Shinkai and Arakita both had identical wet spots in their laps. Arakita had probably shoved his drink over poor Shinkai the minute it had started fizzing up.

"From now on we shall call you the Bepsi twins," Toudou said, unable to resist mocking their rueful state.

"Shut up, primadonna. Where do they have bathrooms here? We're going to change immediately," Arakita announced, already throwing his bag over his shoulder.

"Right next to the entrance there was one."

After Arakita and Shinkai had disappeared, the others started unpacking their stuff from the car. It was better to set up the tents right away, so that they would be ready for them to crawl into when they got tired.

"Is there a grocery store in the camping area?" Sohoku's sprinter bull asked.

"Only some sort of kiosk."

"Wait, so we have nothing to eat?"

"You just ate!"

"That was over two hours ago. I'm not gonna make it through the night with one piece of chicken and a sandwich!" the giant complained, starting to sound desperate.

"We're near the center. Some of us can stay here and set up the tents and some can go and buy some food," Kinjou said.

Tadokoro volunteered as a food courier because nobody knew how to buy enough grub for him. Sohoku's two second-years promised to help him. Toudou waited for Maki-chan to go as well, but the green-haired climber said nothing. So they'd stay and help with the tents.

Toudou had never set up a tent. He hoped that the others had more experience.

As it turned out, at least Fuku and Kinjou had mastered the noble skill of setting up a tent. The others' job was only to follow orders. After some trial and error, their sleeping quarters rose on the grass patch. Shinkai and Arakita were still lingering in the bathrooms, probably on purpose to save themselves from an unpleasant task.

At around eight, their camp was all set. Toudou was happy that he and Maki-chan got one tent only for themselves. There had been a condition though: to sleep next to Tadokoro's tent. Toudou hadn't first understood what kind of trouble would that cause but Maki-chan's face had constricted in pain. When no one else was looking, he had sought Toudou's attention and formed a word with his lips: 'snores'. Well, you couldn't always get everything. Toudou reckoned that the camping area was going to be noisy anyway and snoring would blend in with surrounding sounds.

Shinkai and Arakita had sauntered back at the camp at right about the moment that Kinjou had driven the last stake into the ground. Their supper had also arrived. Baguette, cheese and ham.

Naruko endangered his health again by opening his mouth in the wrong place to the wrong people. "Couldn't you find anything more French?"

"You get to go to bed with an empty stomach for that," Tadokoro grunted.

"Oi, I didn't mean it like that! I just wanted to comment on how extremely well you have blended into our environment."

Toudou hauled himself to his feet from the grass where he had been lying after setting up the tents. He wasn't hungry yet, and besides, the evening activity that he had planned was the sort that shouldn't be done on a full stomach. "Who wants to go swimming?"

"Ooh, I want to go!" All the first-years excluding Imaizumi were ready immediately. None of the older guys said a thing. They didn't even seem to have heard his words. Crap, would he have to babysit the brats? Manami was bound to fall asleep in the middle of swimming and Toudou would have to save the life of that narcoleptic daydreamer.

"Maki-chan, let's go swimming!"

Again, he was ignored. Seriously, this was so annoying! The first-years were already gathering their stuff and babbling absurdities. Suddenly Toudou didn't feel like swimming anymore.

Then Fuku stood up from the back of the van where he'd been sitting, dusted down his pants and announced that he was going for a quick dip. As if it were the first time that anyone had mentioned swimming.

And suddenly half of the group was ready. Izumida, Kinjou, the second-years, even Maki-chan. Toudou stared, stunned, as his travelling mates started rummaging through their bags for swimwear.

"What the hell? I just suggested swimming and nobody wanted to go!"

Nobody seemed to hear him talk. Christ, this was beyond infuriating! He felt like staying in the camp and _pouting_, but he really wanted to swim. Besides, there would be a lot of half-naked French girls on the beach.

Maki-chan's hobby was half-naked girls. Or more specifically, looking at pictures of them. What would he say when he saw all the attracting girls in their bikinis?

Toudou wasn't sure why the thought made him feel uncomfortable. Who cared if Maki-chan was going to peer at girls? Toudou was going to do it himself, too.

In the end, the people to join the swimming trip were everyone except for Shinkai and Arakita who said they had drenched themselves enough for that day and Tadokoro who, according to his own words, sunk like a stone. Toudou could very well believe it. He just hoped that Sohoku's giant sprinter would not stuff his face with their supper while they were away. Even Mr. Pierre was coming along, though nobody knew if he was going to swim. Sohoku's team had kind of hinted that the old man was so clumsy that even if they got him a swimming ring and floaties, he'd still drown.

The night had cooled off enough for the beach to not be crowded. Families had already packed away their sand shovels and buckets for that day. There were still some couples walking across the sand, and a group of young guys were sitting on the other end of the beach, drinking something out of their cans. Otherwise it was quiet. No half-naked girls.

"I'm just going to sit here on the beach and guard your stuff," Mr. Pierre promised, slumping on the sand in a way that could be described as anything but graceful. "My body hasn't been in the right condition for exercise for a few years now."

The others locked themselves in changing cubicles to change into their trunks. It was damn dark in the cubicle after the sunset, and Toudou had to feel out which way to pull on his trunks. From the cubicle next to him came a flood of swearwords and rumble as someone reeled against the wooden wall in the darkness. Funny, he thought that he had seen the mute party of Sohoku's second-year twins to enter that box. He hadn't heard the boy say a word during their trip – and not on any other occasion, for that matter.

He managed to pull his trunks on right, stepped out of the cubicle and immediately realized two details.

Number one: He had never seen the Sohoku guys with so few clothes on, which meant that he hadn't seen Maki-chan with so few clothes on. Before the trip they had only met wearing their cycling outfits and, on an occasion, their school uniforms. He mostly knew about Maki-chan's taste in clothes because he happened be his Facebook friend (getting the acceptance had been such a tedious task that Toudou had considered adding it into his CV with the rest of his work experience). At the hotel Maki-chan had changed his clothes while Toudou had been in the bathroom. Maybe he was just shy, as he differed from the regular beauty standards. He was nothing but white skin, sharp angles and crazily long limbs. Even though Toudou was the same height, Maki-chan looked taller due to his slenderness.

Number two: Toudou was suddenly self-conscious about his body. Not because of Maki-chan but because Sohoku's captain had a trunk of an action hero. And because Sohoku's second-years were more heavily built than him. And because Imaizumi the first-year looked three years older than his actual age. And what about his own teammates then? Toudou had gotten used to Izumida's bulging muscles, but at what point had Fuku developed such impressive shoulders?

Never before had Toudou been insecure about his looks. He didn't like the feeling, didn't like it at all. Somewhere along the way from the first day of Hakone Academy to the last year his hormones had decided he wasn't meant to get broad shoulders or big biceps.

Luckily their troupe included three scrawny weaklings: Onoda, Naruko and Manami. Manami at least looked like he had some chances of development, but Onoda and Naruko were doomed to be stunted for the rest of their lives. Toudou had maybe taken back his words about Onoda's appearance – he wasn't less than three – but he really didn't differ that greatly from a ten-year-old boy.

Then the first-years sunk in the waves and Toudou had to cease his evaluation. He halted at the waterline, allowing a light wave to caress his toes. Uh, it was much colder than he had expected! He had assumed, based on the air temperature, that the waters had warmed up too.

There was only one trick for cold water. Quick dipping.

Everyone else had had the same idea and everywhere he could hear splashes, and icy drops splattered onto his skin before he could sink in up to his neck. The water wasn't _that_ cold after all but he reckoned he couldn't stand to swim for too long.

In the middle of their splashing, Onoda remembered he didn't know how to swim and started floundering towards the beach in a panic, even though the water only reached his chest. Naruko promised to teach Four-eyes and Manami immediately played along. Next the others got to witness how Manami held Onoda's hands while Naruko supported his stomach. The moment Naruko let go, Onoda started kicking water vigorously, blinding everyone in a few meters radius.

There was the sound of laughter on the beach. Toudou turned to look, spotting a group of four young ladies who had paused to watch the swimming show. They weren't even trying to hide their amusement. Onoda, Naruko and Manami hadn't noticed but Imaizumi was inching further away from the blundering trio.

Typical. The moment there were French girls present, Toudou was surrounded by idiots. He was about to lift his index finger – because pointing had quickly become a trademark and eventually a reflex – but managed to stop himself. They weren't in a race or in Japan now. He didn't know how the girls would react to the gesture. It could be considered rude in France.

But should he ask the ladies to join them?

His great idea was ruined by the fact that he only knew two words of French and neither of them worked in this situation.

Besides the girls looked like giants. Seriously, wasn't there a single normal-sized person in this darn country?

Eventually, when Onoda's show didn't offer anything new to watch, the girls wandered off. Toudou let out air that he didn't know he had been holding.

The others were already doing what they had come to the beach for: swimming. Fuku and Kinjou had taken off to crawl side by side lined with the waterline. Once rivals, always rivals, that's how it was. Sohoku's second-years, Izumida and Imaizumi were following the captains after apparently coming to the conclusion that keeping up appearances was worth it in a foreign country too.

Toudou would have been left alone with the moron trio, if at that moment Maki-chan's head hadn't surfaced from the waves.

His unusually coloured hair was falling alongside his neck and shoulders and forming a fan on the surface. Toudou remembered to have wondered about first the speed Maki-chan's hair grew (20 centimeters in a year – just _what_ was he eating?) and second the growing project itself. Didn't it bother him while cycling? Such a flapping cape of hair gathered wind like a sail and was bound to cause unnecessary resistance.

Toudou had wondered and he'd been sure that Maki-chan would look even more out of place with long hair. It was bad enough that his hair was green; was it necessary to have half a meter of it too? Maki-chan didn't like standing out but somehow his choice of style made sure that no one else got a grain of attention.

Toudou had contemplated how he would explain to his opponent that soon he would be too embarrassed to be seen in public with him, but then they met after a couple of months break (too long) and _something_ had happened to Maki-chan. He looked more adult than before. He had grown a little, his shoulders had broadened, his face had gotten more angular and the indifference in his eyes didn't mirror insecurity anymore but instead awareness of his own boundaries. His long hair made him stand out but, oddly enough, in a positive way. Previously Makishima Yuusuke had just been an oddball. Now he was an oddball who had people awe and sometimes even fear him.

And Toudou had noticed that he was thinking that Maki-chan was kind of… pretty. In a weird, feminine way that he didn't exactly understand – not to mention whether or not it was okay for a guy to be pretty in a feminine way – but he hadn't been able to tear his eyes away from him. Like he wasn't now, when he saw his rival straightening up to his full height and the lake water was weaving his hair into dark-green plaits.

At least not before the person in question raised his eyebrows, signalling that he had not only caught Toudou staring but was also wondering about it.

Toudou tried to laugh but could only form a noise that sounded like a cat with a nasty cold.

Maki-chan lowered his other eyebrow, making it look even more like his brows had a will of their own. "What's wrong with you?"

"I swallowed some water," Toudou coughed. "And possibly a small fish too."

"Nice. Now you'll get all the fish's parasites. We must get you treatment once we get back home."

Toudou's brain stopped at the part 'we must'. _We_ must. Was Maki-chan going to help him when they were back home? He wasn't saying it out of carelessness, since he knew that Toudou was always listening. Usually Maki-chan paid extra attention to his choice of words.

"You have never been so concerned about my wellbeing before."

The green-haired climber cleared his throat, looking away. "I'm not. The purpose of my comment was only to emphasize your distress."

Toudou tilted his head. "Aww, Maki-chan, you wouldn't really want me to suffer from parasites, would you?"

Maki-chan looked at him with that quite familiar gaze of his that stated 'Toudou Jinpachi, this is the time for you to shut your mouth', making Toudou snicker to himself.

"Shall we have a little swimming match as well?" he suggested then. It would him give something more sensible to do than staring at other men or the four-eyed nerd's miserable swimming lesson.

Maki-chan wiped wet locks away from his eyes. "Where shall we race to then?"

"That bight?" Toudou pointed at a curve in the water line at ten o'clock from where they were standing.

"But you must promise not to cry when you lose."

Toudou smirked. "Haven't cried before and I'm not about to start now."


	7. Chapter 7

A/N: Thank you everyone who favorited or left a comment!**  
**

* * *

**Chapter 7 – Just one beer**

~o~

'_Are you sharing a room with that maniac again?'_

_Maniac?_ Shinkai glanced over his phone at his tent mate who had managed to engage himself in a scuffle with his bag, spewing out completely unprintable language. Maybe he could be called aggressive on some occasions, though in Shinkai's opinion Yasutomo was more about ranting and less about actually executing his threats. There was a rumour, however, that when they had first met, Yasutomo had actually attacked Juichi but a good amount of time had elapsed since then. Age did its job even with snappers like Yasutomo.

Ayane's choice of words was perplexing, to say the least. Shinkai had already read between the lines that she wasn't very fond of all of his teammates but she had never been this frank before.

'_Yasutomo? Yeah, I am. How come?'_ The question came as a reflex and only after sending the message did he remember he was supposed to pinch in using his cell. On the other hand it probably would have pestered him, had he not asked. He didn't mention that they had to sleep in a tent. Ayane was already worrying too much.

He tucked his hand under his pillow to lift his head higher. Yasutomo was still rummaging through his bag. They had taken one of the smaller tents; the smallest one, some might say. It wasn't made for one person per se, but maybe for one and a half? When they had been sharing their sleeping quarters, Yasutomo had blurted out that he and Shinkai would take the smallest tent. Unbelievably enough, Jinpachi had tried to argue for a moment – he'd insisted on having the tiny-ass tent for himself and Makishima – but after Yasutomo had threatened to shove one of Jinpachi's headbands up his ass, they had quickly come to terms. Shinkai didn't really care where he slept as long as he had his own sleeping bag. But it was going to be extremely cramped. Luckily the camping area had a lawn. He had once camped in a place that had patches covered in macadam. Now that could be called a tribulation.

His phone beeped again.

'_I don't want you to sleep in the same room as that guy. I don't like the way he looks at you.'_

Wha..? He had to read the message three times before he was sure he wasn't seeing things. _Looks at me? What way?_

Yasutomo looked at everyone in the same way: like other people only existed to annoy him. He had probably chosen the tiniest tent only so that he could rampage and kick Shinkai and accuse him of taking up all the space. A slightly draining attitude but what could you do? One day Yasutomo would make an interesting project for some brave shrink.

The young man in question had just finished his scavenging and attached a charger he'd found into his cell phone. Shinkai watched, somewhat amused, as he turned his head around, looking for a socket in the green fabric walls. How long would it take for him to realize?

About four seconds. "Ah fuck!"

"There's an electrical post outside," Shinkai told him.

"No way I'm leaving my phone out there for everyone to fondle."

"You're not going to use it here anyway."

"You are using yours."

"Yeah well… I lack some common sense."

"You're right about that", Yasutomo sneered, lowering his hands and seemingly pondering his options. "Hey, wanna go to a bar?"

Shinkai dropped his hand that was holding his own phone and got up onto his elbows. "What?"

"Right outside the entrance there was a bar. Wanna go and have a beer? I could recharge my phone there."

"We're underage. They won't let us in."

Yasutomo looked at him, lifting his eyebrow meaningfully. "We're in Europe now. In France. They mix wine in breast milk here."

"Hmm, I suppose. Maybe." He thought about it for a second. "But we've got an early wake up call tomorrow."

"We don't have to stay for long. Let's just have one beer. I could recharge my phone so that the battery lasts until the morning and after that I can plug it in the car's charger."

Shinkai pondered it some more. He was tired and his limbs felt like a bag of bricks, but it was only 9 pm and they still needed to reset their inner clocks. Maybe if they stayed for just half an hour…

He hauled himself up, tucking his phone into his pocket. Ayane could wait for his reply. It was too early to be awake in Japan anyway. "Well, if it's only one beer."

Yasutomo crawled out of the tent first. Shinkai followed after grabbing an energy bar for provision. The night was getting chillier, and he took a moment to test if his tee shirt and shorts would be enough, but Yasutomo was already going, sauntering towards the front gate with his hands stuffed in his pockets, and Shinkai had to rush after him.

"We'll just pop quickly in a bar just outside the entrance," he told Tadokoro who sat in the back of the van, inhaling a baguette. The others had yet to return from their swimming trip.

"What bar?"

"There's seems to be a small place next to the gate. We won't be long."

Sohoku's sprinter grunted something, concentrating on his snack again. Shinkai headed off to catch his teammate.

The camping area didn't show any signs of going to bed, even though darkness had already set. Many families were still barbecuing their supper, some people were walking their dogs, and groups of youngsters were sitting on the lawn listening to music. Shinkai thought that he could make out some different languages from the camps but he couldn't identify them. Oh well, he had never had a brain for languages anyway.

"It's funny when you understand absolutely nothing of what people are talking about around you," he said after catching up with Yasutomo. He unwrapped his PowerBar, taking a bite. It was good that he had his own snacks because judging by the speed Tadokoro that was gobbling at there wouldn't be a crumb of baguette left when they returned.

Yasutomo glanced at him out of the corner of his eye. "Tourists probably feel the same way in Japan. Not many of them can read kana or kanji."

"The city plans are also weird here. And have you noticed that every street has a name?"

"Mm-m, I noticed in Paris."

"Interesting how differently you can do things," Shinkai huffed. "Have you been abroad before?"

"No."

"Me neither."

They continued their walking in a companionable silence. Shinkai munched his energy bar, and Yasutomo peered at the scenery surrounding them, occasionally sneering at faults that he spotted. Shinkai hadn't seen the bar when they had visited the bathrooms to change their clothes but from the gate you couldn't really miss it. A small individual building that had a patio lighted with lanterns and fenced with flower pots and junipers. There was the sound of French dubstep coming from the open door and tables were occupied by young customers. Good, for a moment Shinkai had anticipated that Yasutomo was dragging him to middle-aged truck drivers' regular location.

"I'm still pretty sure they won't let us in," he said.

They were let in. Nobody asked to see their ID's. Nobody even seemed to care whether they entered or not. In fact, there wasn't even a bouncer at the door.

"Do you know how to order a beer in French?" Shinkai asked once they were standing at the end of a short queue leading to the counter. The place was even smaller than its exterior had suggested. With a quick glance he counted a dozen tables sprinkled here and there in the tiny space.

Yasutomo peeked at him over his shoulder. "No. I thought you'd know."

"I left my dictionary back at the camp."

"Oh for fuck's sake."

"We'll just have to point at what we want. I reckon they understand gestures in this part of the world too."

When it was their turn, Shinkai pointed at the previous customers carrying beer pints and lifted two fingers. The bartender asked something to which Shinkai smartly answered '_non_'. The guy probably wanted to know if they'd like some ice in their beer or something as equally weird.

Yasutomo looked at him. "What did he ask?"

"I have no idea. Let's see what we get."

The bartender placed two ciders on the counter. With ice.

"So you ordered us pre-teenage girls' drinks," Yasutomo remarked.

"But I pointed at those previous customers."

"The woman had a cider. The bartender must have asked if you wanted beer or cider. Excellent work, Shinkai."

The bartender was saying something else to them just now; judging by his tone he was telling them to bugger off. Shinkai grabbed the pints and made a beeline to the patio through the people pouring in. "Who knows, maybe French cider is good?" he said over his shoulder. Yasutomo just grunted something.

They found a free table. It was placed in a corner that everyone came to smoke in front of and it wiggled horribly every time they laid their arms on it and on top of that in the table next to them a chubby man was guffawing loudly every other minute but otherwise it was passable.

Yasutomo voiced his opinion immediately. "This place sucks."

"You're the one who wanted to come."

"It looked a bit classier from afar."

"Come on, it's not like we're moving in here. Besides, the cider is pretty good," Shinkai said after tasting his drink.

Yasutomo took a sip but didn't say anything. That was a sign that he liked his drink but his pride prevented him from admitting it.

"Isn't it weird?" Shinkai continued. "We can talk about whatever we want and nobody can understand us. We could rate all the other customers without them realizing."

"You seriously decided to become a chick?"

Shinkai chuckled. "No, just pointing out that we don't have to be careful with our words."

"It sounded like you wanted to gossip."

Shinkai laughed again and took another mouthful of his drink. "What is this, apple or pear?"

"Who fucking cares?" Yasutomo was gulping down his drink with a crazy speed. He probably wanted to get away from the bar soon if he considered it shoddy. "Oi, Shinkai."

"Yeah?"

"That chick of yours… Ayane, was it?"

Hmh, Yasutomo definitely knew his girlfriend's name. "What about her?"

"What did she say when you decided to go to Europe for ten days?"

"Nothing, why would she?" He shrugged. Okay, so maybe she had demanded that he bring her some French perfume and after the trip he needed to spend a whole week with her and her only. Under the same roof.

He wasn't sure what Ayane's parents would say about that. Because the only possible arrangement would be Ayane coming over to Shinkai's. He didn't want to leave Usakichi alone right after his return. Yuuto had already demonstrated that he didn't have a clue about how to take care of pets. Shinkai was not too keen to find his little brother feeding his bunny chocolate cake again.

"She keeps texting you all the time."

"Shouldn't she?" Shinkai challenged.

"It's expensive for you to message from here. Is she having a hard time believing that you can keep your hands off of French chicks?"

"They are not that kind of messages," he argued. Ayane had never asked him about other girls. She was only interested in where Shinkai was and what he was doing. Wasn't that normal in a relationship?

Yasutomo leaned closer to stare at him with a rare 'I have valuable information for you and it might affect the rest of your life, and even if it's your own business whether you take my advice or not, I suggest you listen carefully' gaze of his. Was this the way he was looking at Shinkai that Ayane had mentioned?

"Shinkai, girls are cunning. They never say it directly. They ask nonchalantly what you have done during the day and then draw a conclusion about whether or not you have been sousing your dick in a foreign pond."

_Just what on Earth do you have against Ayane?_ Shinkai felt like asking. He didn't, though, since obviously Ayane had something against Yasutomo too.

"Well, she can draw all the conclusions she wants," he said. "Like there was time to check out girls in the middle of a race."

Yasutomo hmph'd, picking up his pint again. A third of its content disappeared down his throat.

Shinkai decided to change the subject. "But really, think about it, in fifteen hours or so we'll be watching the Tour. Can you believe it?"

"Hopefully we get to see Arashiro."

"Must be a bit hard in such a big bunch of cyclists. But maybe Mr. Pierre knows some good spots for watching."

"The first time I saw the geezer, I thought he was a local nutcase."

"Same here. But that could be part of his strategy. He pretends to be a nutter so nobody expects any great plans from him. Many people thought that Sohoku was a small fry but look what happened."

"I'd still say that Sohoku owes most of their success to Kinjou," Yasutomo remarked.

"That too."

"That old man can't even ride anymore."

"He can still be a good strategist."

A snort. Yasutomo drank out of his glass. Shinkai glanced at his own pint, noticing that he was very much behind. Knowing Yasutomo, he'd get up immediately after swallowing the last drop and head off to the camp, and Shinkai didn't want to waste a drink in which he had spent a few coins of his meagre holiday budget. He took a generous gulp of his cider, so that gas bubbles rushed up his nose, burning and making his eyes water.

"Careful now, Shinkai," Yasutomo said. "It's not a banana milkshake."

Shinkai wiped the corners of his eyes. "I was just trying to keep up with you."

"Go ahead then." Yasutomo tilted his glass for the last time before slamming it back on the table. "I'm going get us seconds."

Oh? Oh.

Shinkai was left to stare, stupefied, at his teammate's receding back. Weren't they supposed to have only one beer?

* * *

During the next hour it turned out that 'one beer' didn't mean 'a pint per person' in Yasutomo's vocabulary. Shinkai stared at the cluster of glasses occupying their table and tried to remember if he had drank three or four of them. His phone had beeped once during their bar excursion. Jinpachi had wanted to know if they were lost. _'Everything's fine. We'll be back soon,_' Shinkai had replied. But now he wasn't so sure that they'd be back soon. Or even before the early morning.

"Hey, Shinkai," Yasutomo said. For the whole evening, he'd been starting his sentences with Shinkai's name, as if there were other people at the table and he needed to emphasize that he was directing his words to Shinkai. "Have you ever thought..?" He trailed off in mid-sentence to take a sip of his beer. How many was that already? Fourth or fifth? "..have you ever thought about what it would be like to have sex with a guy?"

Out of all the questions Shinkai could have expected, this one wasn't on the list. Yasutomo tended to use crude language but usually he wasn't being serious. And now he seemed to be. Serious. Even if he tried to mask it under a nascent drunkenness.

Or perhaps he was already pissed. Shinkai didn't know because he'd only seen his teammate drunk once. Back then Yasutomo had challenged Izumida to weightlifting contest – and lost. The evening had ended in Yasutomo dropping a weight on his toe and he had been taken to ER on quite a questionable ride. Also a very drunken Jinpachi had thought that nothing would be funnier than taking the wounded teammate to hospital on the rear rack of a bicycle. Since none of them had a driving licence, not to mention a car, Yasutomo had eventually agreed. Still, Shinkai was sure he'd never heard Japanese used as creatively before that night.

Anyhow, it was quite hard to tell whether Yasutomo was just tipsy or downright wasted. He didn't really slur or teeter, simply just swore more and became more contentious.

"Yes, I have," he said.

That apparently wasn't the answer that his drinking buddy had been waiting for. Yasutomo's eyebrows shot up to his hairline and his upper lip pulled back to reveal a row of even, white teeth. "You have?"

"I'm pretty sure everyone has thought about it at some point. I mean, when musing over their opinion on the matter. 'How would I feel about it', you know? It doesn't mean that you'd given it a serious thought or actually planned to try it out."

His companion was silent for a moment. "Yeah."

Shinkai waited but when Yasutomo didn't continue, he lifted his glass to his lips again. This was absolutely the last beer. He could already feel alcohol rambling around his system, making his muscles lethargic and his thoughts sluggish. He had drunk too much in a too short period of time and with an almost empty stomach. And he didn't even like the taste of beer. Hngh, he should have known better.

On the other hand… why not continue until the end since they were already over halfway?

"What the fuck is Toudou goofing around for?" Yasutomo blurted out next. Shinkai got a feeling that the previous question had not been an introduction to this but Yasutomo was using Jinpachi as a diversion.

He had no idea at what point had he learned to profile his teammate so accurately. But now when he really thought about it, he was actually quite good at it. Heh.

_Wait a minute. What did Yasutomo ask me last night?_

_Was it even Yasutomo?_

"What goofing around?" he asked, though he reckoned he already knew. Just playing along...

"He's constantly all over that Sohoku's third-year climber."

"He's been doing it for ages."

"I know, but it's getting worse. Yeah, so they don't see each other all the time because of the distance but since the flight Toudou has been clinging to that green-haired creep like a leech."

"Maybe it's precisely because they don't get to see each other that often."

"So what? I'm not clinging to Imaizumi even though I see him once in two months or so."

"You don't have any kind of emotional bond with Imaizumi. Jinpachi and Makishima are good friends."

"Are they?" Yasutomo asked. His tone challenged, and he leaned towards Shinkai. Alcohol had slightly dulled the sharpness of his eyes but his gaze was still demanding an answer.

"What? Friends?"

"_Only_ friends?"

"I suppose so."

A small creature in the back corner of Shinkai's brain was roaring with laughter.

"Mark my words; something is not right in that combination."

"Jinpachi just has a bit of a different view of friendship than us."

"Yeah, extremely fucking ga–" A bubbling burp interrupted Yasutomo's words. He didn't even try to hold it in which could have been a sign of a deepening state of inebriation – or then again, not. "I wouldn't be surprised if after this holiday he told us that he's moving to Chiba."

"Well, Makishima would talk him out of it."

Yasutomo snorted to himself, turning to look at the camping area over the plant fence. "Toudou has always been such a chick."

Shinkai felt a smile tugging at his lips. Not because of what Yasutomo had said about Jinpachi, but because of the devotion he had said it with. It seemed that today's theme had been chicks and guys who could be called chicks. "And yet he's the most popular of us amongst girls," he noted.

"Girls don't understand what's best for them. Besides, Toudou might be the most popular amongst the fans but you're the only one of us who's got a girlfriend. What does it matter to have fangirls if you understand nothing about women?"

"Ayane wasn't our fan," Shinkai couldn't stop himself from clearing that up. "She still isn't." That had been one of the criteria for them to start dating. Shinkai wanted the girl to be with him for himself, not because he happened to be part of a successful sports club. Though, sometimes he wished that Ayane would be a tad more understanding about the devotion that cycling required from him.

"I'm sure."

"She really wasn't."

Yasutomo looked at him, his brow rising meaningfully. "It wasn't a sarcastic comment."

So the guys had also taken notice that Ayane didn't exactly love Shinkai's hobby. Or not that there was anything wrong with the hobby itself, only the fact that Shinkai's intense practise and race schedule snatched a big slice off of their time together.

"But to return to the previous topic…" Yasutomo stooped closer, lowering his voice even though nobody understood them anyway. "Is there a price?"

"What price?"

"We just talked about it." A frustrated eye roll. "Is there a price that would make you agree to have sex with a guy?"

* * *

A/N: After I had already written several chapters, I found out that most of the Hakogaku guys are living in dorms, not at home. In this fic I hint that at least Shinkai is still living at home and it would be kinda pain in the ass to start changing it now, so I'll just go with my original image. Of course you can imagine that he's staying back home just for the summer break. Again a detail that really has no significance whatsoever for the plot, I'm just a bit displeased because I like to have my facts straight (I'm weird in that way).


	8. Chapter 8

Again, thanks for everyone who favourited or left a review! Some readers were wondering about Shinkai's girlfriend, but if you read the fic carefully, she was actually introduced already in the first chapter. Can't have everything going smoothly, can we? ;)

* * *

**Chapter 8 – It's a matter of… Gackt?**

~o~**  
**

"Is there a price that would make you agree to have sex with a guy?"

Oo-kay. Shinkai huffed. He had... kind of expected the question, but it still stunned him into silence. Because he hadn't seriously thought that Yasutomo would ask. Or he had thought that he'd at least form his question differently. Maybe snort that he'd not be willing to do such things in a million years, but Shinkai, Shinkai was different. Because he looked semi-gay or something equally as clever. Hadn't Yasutomo once said that Shinkai had a woman's lips?

Yeah, he had. The praise in its entirety had been something along the lines of Shinkai's whole face being a paradox (they had just got out from a math lesson and Yasutomo had yearned to use a new term he'd just learned) because he had the lips of a female porn star but a guy's nose and the eyes of a noble Englishman. Shinkai had replied that some day Yasutomo was bound to be crushed under his eloquent compliments.

Thinking about it made him smile.

"What are you grinning at, moron? I asked a perfectly valid question. Or is your price so low that even thinking about it makes you laugh?"

"I wouldn't want money."

Yasutomo let out one of his barks of which you couldn't say with your eyes closed whether it came out of a human's or animal's mouth. He had made the same sound when Sohoku's miniature climbing wonder had caught up with them from the last place in the Inter High. Usually the sound denoted astonishment, this time too.

Shinkai began to explain. "I could in theory – note, in _theory_ – maybe do it out of curiosity. I mean if I did it, I think curiosity or the will to experience something new are better reasons than money. Accepting payment would make me feel like a prostitute." He shrugged. No need to make a big deal out of it. In any case, he was in a relationship with a girl. The guys knew he didn't play for the opposite team. "How about you? What would be your price?"

Yasutomo glanced at him. "We're never going to talk about this in the front of the others. This conversation stays in this bar."

Shinkai nodded, laughing. "Deal."

"I wouldn't want money either. It is… _would be_ more a question of... whom. Who I'd do it with."

"Well yeah, I wouldn't jump into bed with some old pedobear either. It ought to be someone close to my own age. Preferably someone with experience because I've got none."

"So who'd you be willing to do it with?"

"Hm?"

"Say someone you'd do it with if the opportunity presented itself."

"I'm not going to say any names," Shinkai refused. There was a limit for gay talks too. And he couldn't just name someone out of the blue except maybe… "Gackt?"

Yasutomo looked at him like you look at idiots who start yelling certain dates and names of militant groups at an airport. "_Gackt?!_"

"Yeah. Or I don't know. It just popped into my head."

"You'd do it with a forty-year-old dude?! You just said 'someone close to your own age'."

"I told you, it just popped into my head," Shinkai defended himself. Why the hell had he blurted out something like that? He didn't really want to try horizontal tango with Gackt – or any other man for that matter. He felt his cheeks starting to gain heat. Jesus Christ, it must have been the booze talking.

Yasutomo burst into laughter. For the first time in his life, Shinkai felt like punching him.

"I'll make sure you'll never forget that!"

"Didn't you say these talks will stay in this bar?"

"Nah, this is too juicy!" More guffawing.

_Asshole_, Shinkai thought. He was on the verge of breaking character and giving Yasutomo such a good piece of his mind that he wouldn't talk to him for the rest of the trip. If Yasutomo ever mentioned it in front of Ayane…

"It's your turn," he grunted.

Yasutomo was wiping his eyes. "Oh my god, that was golden, Shinkai! _Golden_."

"Your turn," Shinkai repeated more emphatically.

"I need to think for a bit." Yasutomo pushed his chair back, scrambling to his feet. The hem of his shirt got stuck in the corner of the table and he tugged it free, not caring if it tore. "I'm gonna get us one more drink."

_One more?!_

"Um, Yasutomo, I don't think that's such a good idea…"

"Shut up. It's a great idea. I'll ask the bartender if I can recharge my phone on the counter."

Shinkai frowned. "Sorry if this is a stupid question, but at what point in the evening did you start speaking French?"

"They'll understand if I show them my phone and charger."

Shinkai wasn't so sure. French people seemed to methodically refuse to understand any language other than their own. But let Yasutomo try. One of the bartenders was a 190 centimeters tall gorilla who would definitely chasten any difficult customer.

When Yasutomo returned, he wasn't carrying pints but two clear shots and a small pack of L&M.

Shinkai raised his eyebrows.

"Don't bother judging me, bunny lover," Yasutomo spat, unwrapping the pack and shaking out a cigarette. "We're not in the middle of a race now. I smoke maybe two fags a year. It doesn't affect my physical condition."

"I didn't mean that. What's in them?" Shinkai pointed at the small glasses.

"I have no idea. I said 'deux shots' or something at the counter." Yasutomo turned to the customers at the table next to them, gesturing to get his cigarette lit.

"I don't know about you but I'm nearing the condition where drinking shots is not really the wisest idea." They had drunk so fast that not all of the alcohol had been absorbed into their systems yet. The final impact was yet to come, and at that point Shinkai would have gladly been on his way back to the camp.

"There's the same amount of alcohol in a shot as in a pint of beer. We were going to have one more anyway, so what does it matter what form the alcohol comes in?"

_You were the one wanting to have one more. I wanted to go to sleep._ The evening was turning into night, and the chilliness was gnawing on Shinkai's bare arms and legs, making the hair on them stand on end. He was aware of the fact that without the alcohol swimming around in his blood, he would have shivered.

"These are absolutely the last ones," he said, picking up one of the glasses. The clear liquid smelled suffocatingly like booze and mildly like herb.

Yasutomo took a drag of his cigarette, exhaling smoke onto Shinkai's face. "If you say so."

Shinkai took a firmer grip on his glass, knocking it back into his throat. A searing burn, hellish stinging and disgusting taste exploded inside his head, threatening to make him gag. _This_ was the reason he didn't drink hard liquors. He opened his mouth, panting and blinking tears out of his eyes. Why wasn't there any water on their table? He knew that his sense of taste was somewhat feminine – nobody else in their team liked chocolate, not even Jinpachi, though it was possible that he just refused to eat it due to his health nerdiness – but it was still hard to imagine that Yasutomo would be that delighted with the taste of the shot.

His teammate was preparing to gulp down his drink. Shinkai waited.

He could not help but to gloat when Yasutomo failed to down it in one go. He stopped mid-way, squeezed his eyes shut as they started to water and stuck his tongue out, coughing and looking suddenly very nauseous.

"Careful now, Yasutomo. It's not Bepsi."

"Zip it." Yasutomo inhaled deeply, knocking down the rest of his shot. His reaction wasn't as strong now that he knew what to expect but he still looked liked he was trying not to puke.

"What about your phone?"

Yasutomo swallowed a couple of times before glancing at his cell and charger lying on the table. "Oh yeah, right. I forgot. I'll just recharge it in the car tomorrow."

"Okay then, are you ready to answer your own question?"

Yasutomo cleared his throat, taking a few puffs of his cigarette and tapping it on the side of the ashtray. "I don't know. I don't have anyone in my mind. I was talking on a general level."

"Hey, you made me answer, so it's only fair that you say a name too."

"I didn't make you. You blurted Gackt out of your mouth on your own." A mocking smile returned to Yasutomo's lips.

Shinkai decided it was time for a little payback. "It's Jinpachi, isn't it?"

He'd never seen anyone sober up so fast. "Huh?"

"That's why you brought him up. You have been thinking about trying it with Jinpachi. You'd like to bend him over a table and–"

Yasutomo hauled his hands in the air so harshly that the cigarette flew from between his fingers. Luckily nobody was sitting behind them. "Stop, stop, _stop!_ No, I wouldn't! Jesus fuck, what are you talking about?"

"Well, you did bring him up–"

"Because Toudou is gayer than the gayest member of the Village People! Not because I wanted to screw him! Tanuki's scrotum, Shinkai, what is the matter with you? Why are you even implying such things? I'd puke if we weren't sitting in a bar's patio."

Shinkai felt a very uncharacteristic giggle bubbling in his throat. Man, revenge was sometimes sweet!

"If Jinpachi is that gay, wouldn't he be a good target for your experiment?"

"I don't wanna screw any bitches. Besides, he'd probably scream Sohoku's climber's name the whole time."

Shinkai couldn't hold the bubbling down anymore. A very startling, very unmanly giggle broke out from between his teeth.

Yasutomo tilted his head. "Are you perhaps a little drunk, Shinkai?"

Shinkai covered his mouth with his hand and kept it there for as long as the fizzing continued. It was one those giggle fits that you only got when you were overly tired or buzzed. They were impossible to control. He could only wait until his muscles grew tired. He had probably never sounded less like himself.

"Yeah, you are. You are fucking smashed," Yasutomo summed up.

Shinkai continued to chortle for an indefinite amount of time – enough to make everyone on the patio stare at them – before running out of oxygen booted his survival instinct, chasing the laughter away. He coughed, wiping the corners of his eyes before he dared to speak.

"Possibly." Yeah, he was plastered. He didn't usually drink that much alcohol because it didn't go well with a target-oriented sports hobby, so even small amounts shot right up to his head. It was that last dose that had pushed him from being just drunk to being totally shitfaced. "Shall we… go back?" he suggested. There wasn't anything to drink on their table anymore and he could still summon enough willpower to end their boozing.

Yasutomo scanned over their surroundings. People around them were chatting, drinking and having fun, but he realized their situation. They were already beyond the point where they'd be feeling alright the following day. Jinpachi was going to have their asses in the morning.

"Okay, let's go then."

They got up. Yasutomo had no trouble but Shinkai, who hadn't lifted his ass from the cheap patio chair for the whole evening, felt his legs melting down to goo the moment that he put his weight on them. He had to support himself on the table, which would have tipped over and hit him in the face, had Yasutomo not held it from the opposite side.

"For the love of god, try to stay on your feet!" Yasutomo yelped, but he was already coming over to support Shinkai. He had to guide him to the entrance because there was so little room and Shinkai was bumbling into all imaginable things (and one person which resulted in him digging through his brain for the only French word he had memorized: _merci_). The yard had more space and he stopped to find his balance again. Yasutomo was looking at him, his face scrunched up in suffering.

Or maybe he would have been looking at him, if Shinkai's vision had been working. Which it wasn't.

He tried moving, told his right leg to take a step. It did. And then the left one. It was obeying too. Alright, the connection between his legs and brain was restored.

"You show the way," he said, though his speech really wasn't speech anymore, but incoherent alien mumbling. "That las– drink might 'ave–"

That last drink had gotten into his head _fast_. Just moments ago he had articulated comprehensibly and been aware of his surroundings, and now he was swaying and teetering like… well, a drunkard.

Yasutomo swore something under his breath, but grabbed his arm nonetheless and started walking him. Hopefully towards the camp. Shinkai had completely lost his sense of direction.

* * *

He began to discern something of his surroundings when they made it back to the camp. He could make out their vehicle and a row of tents. He wouldn't have found his own tent but luckily Yasutomo was nowhere near as drunk as him. Which really could be called a miracle because they had drunk about the same amount and Yasutomo was slenderer than him. Maybe he was just more experienced.

There was someone sitting on the yard even though it had to be past midnight. The figure was wearing a yellow shirt and black pants. Shinkai couldn't identify it before it opened its mouth.

"Finally. I promised Toudou I'd stay awake and wait for you to come back."

"Sorry, Juichi," Shinkai muttered. "We're fi– Nggh, oi, Yasutomo, I need… need to ta– a leak."

Yasutomo exploded right by his ear. "You just did a minute ago!"

"Oh really?" Shinkai tried to remember. Now that he gave it a second thought, his bladder didn't feel full. Alright then. Good that at least one of them had a working brain. He wished to remember whether he had gone to a bathroom or just pissed on the side of the road. Knowing Yasutomo he had suggested the latter and Shinkai might have obeyed in his loosened sense of modesty.

"We're gonna hit the sack," Yasutomo said, letting go of him. A sudden lack of support made him slump on the grass. "You should too, Fuku-chan."

"I'm already going. Like I said, I was waiting for you." A short, meaningful pause. "I hope you'll sober up by the morning."

"What do you think we are, babies?" Yasutomo snarled, squatting next to Shinkai. He lifted his head with a struggle, blinking in hope to get some clearly outlined objects in his field of vision. Oh, he was lying right in front of a tent. Yasutomo had a nice aim, but after all, he had pitched in baseball before.

His drinking buddy opened the tent zipper and poked him in the ribs. "Get in."

"Here, have a bottle of water," Juichi offered. Shinkai could only see his sandals and ankles, unable to crane his neck further. Yasutomo possessed at least some manners, muttering a quiet 'Thanks' to Juichi.

Shinkai had no idea how they made it inside the tent. His recollection of memories ended in lying in the grass and continued when he was sprawled on his sleeping bag, staring at the army green fabric. He could hear rustling beside him as Yasutomo apparently was opening his own sleeping bag.

"Let me know immediately if you start feeling sick. If you puke in the tent, I'll make a jacket out of you for Usakichi."

"Hehe, he'd get so many jackets out of me…"

"Do you understand what I'm saying? I'm not going to wake up to the sound of puking, and especially not to the smell."

"Yeah, I get it..." Shinkai didn't usually throw up after consuming alcohol. Except that one time when he'd been fifteen and tried sake for the first and last time in his life.

Yasutomo changed his clothes and settled down in his sleeping bag. Shinkai had no chance to change into his nightwear. His muscles were completely flaccid. Maybe it was better this way, since it was rather cold in the tent. The night was bound to get chillier and he was sensitive to the cold anyway.

"Yasut– could... you..? He swallowed the acid that was climbing up his throat. "..help me get… inside my sleep– bag?"

His black-haired friend sneered. "And how do you suppose I'd do that? There's about half a centimeter of extra space here."

"You were the one… wanted…" _You were the one who wanted the tiniest tent._

Shinkai felt himself being pushed against the side of the tent. The ground beneath him started moving. Yasutomo tugged the sleeping bag, making him roll onto his side his face against the fabric. Then there was an audible crackle of a zipper.

"There you go," Yasutomo grunted, arranging the sleeping bag back on the ground and pulling Shinkai on top of it. "You can get in there by yourself, right?"

Shinkai tried. If he slipped his leg in there… and lifted his ass... and his other leg would go in there…

"Ready." He relaxed and looked at Yasutomo – or at least in his general direction – expectantly until his tent buddy leaned over him to zip up his sleeping bag.

"You're such a big baby. Next time remind me that I won't allow you to get drunk, if you become like this."

Shinkai was too sleepy to answer. Instead, he searched for a better position in the tight bag. Something was pressing on his hip and after fumbling around for a moment he pulled out his forgotten phone. Okay, now he was warm and had a pillow under his head. Everything set. Though, on second thought, there was the tiniest feeling circling around in his stomach.

"Could you please find me an energy bar from my bag?"

"No, I couldn't!" Yasutomo snarled. "You'll do without it until the morning."

Maybe he would then. But wasn't there this advice that you should eat and drink water between alcohol doses so you wouldn't get hung over that easily? They had done everything wrong. Shinkai crawled onto his side inside his bag, facing the fabric wall. His lids were heavy and thoughts were crawling around mindlessly, the world starting to darken on its edges. He'd probably fall asleep the moment he closed his eyes.

Then Yasutomo coughed. It wasn't one of those coughs that clear your throat but one of those that try to attract others' attention. Shinkai sighed, trying to keep his lids open for a few more seconds.

"About that question…" Yasutomo muttered barely audibly. "Actually there is someone… I could consider. I mean, if I had to. Or if the curiosity became overwhelming."

_Excuse me, are we still talking about this? Couldn't we talk, for instance, about cycling? Or better yet, couldn't we just sleep?"_

Shinkai hummed to let his tent mate know that he was listening. He waited, fighting against the approaching twilight, but Yasutomo, that devil in humans' clothes, couldn't blurt out his issue after all.

"Mhmh?" Shinkai tried again but his friend stayed quiet. Fine then. He could hear it tomorrow.

There was a rustle of fabric behind him. Every time one of them moved they unintentionally touched each other. The tent wasn't designed for two adult-sized males. Next time, Shinkai was going to make sure that they'd take a bigger one. Jinpachi was free to cuddle with Maki-chan in the play tent.

Thinking about Jinpachi made him feel like giggling. Shinkai allowed one snigger to escape his throat but then he pressed his lips together, swallowing the bubbles. Time to sleep. His lids slid shut, and he started to float further into dusk. He would have probably fallen asleep immediately, but then a warm weight settled against his back. And not just his back but his ass and his thighs too. A hot puff of air ruffled his hair. It smelled faintly like cigarettes.

With a great effort he managed to form a full sentence. "Can't you… move… back… a little?" Yasutomo had been further away just a minute ago. Their arms had touched but lying on their sides made more room in the tent, so logically thinking Yasutomo would be able to leave a few centimeters between them.

"There's no room to do anything," Yasutomo mumbled. His voice came from really close. If Shinkai had turned his head, their noses would probably have touched.

A vague inkling was bothering him. He still felt like he should say something, but he was beyond the point where he could still have returned to wakefulness. He could muse over it tomorrow when his mind had rested and thoughts were again rolling in the right direction.

"Good night," he said – or at least hoped to say. After that his brain turned off the lights.

* * *

"What would be your price to let someone fuck you?"

"Mhhm?" Shinkai tried to blink. "What..?" Then the question pierced the top layer of understanding, making him remember what they had talked about before. What freaking _nonsense_ they had talked about. There was a foreign weight, a foreign presence hovering above him. His limbs were bound by the sleeping bag but the weight felt heavier than fabric. After he managed to crack his eyes open, he could make out a human figure. A primitive instinct told him to be startled – because people got startled if all of a sudden someone climbed over them – but his body was too numbed by alcohol. Besides, after giving it a second thought, he realized that the creature above him was just Yasutomo. He was supporting himself on all fours, balancing over Shinkai like asking for a confession. Yeah, suppose that was what he actually wanted. "Mm… I wouldn't want... money... told ya... it'd depend... on the guy…" Shinkai tried to form a coherent sentence.

"If it were Gackt?"

"Naah," Shinkai waved his hand, although probably only in his imagination. "That was… was a slip of the tongue, told ya so… no Gackt."

"What if it was… one of us?"

Shinkai was frowning very hard, trying to make his head work at least on half-speed. "Jinpachi? Dunno… he's a bit… he only sees… sees that… Makish–" His throat suddenly snapped, closing and then opening again, forcing him to swallow bitter liquid gathering in the back of his mouth.

Yasutomo let his head hang in defeat. "Fuck, you're slow."

"Mmm… I'm… _drunk off my ass_, Yasut– I don't know… can't this wait..?"

Yasutomo suddenly shoved his face way too close, almost touching him, his sharp eyes drilling into Shinkai's. "What if it was… me?"

"You?" Shinkai felt the world swaying and he was abruptly hit by an urge to attach a cute clip of music into it. So he did. Only his humming managed to sound exceptionally drained and drunken.

Yasutomo poked him in the face with his nose. It was quite bizarre, since until then the only people to have had their faces so close to his were his mom and Ayane. And Usakichi too, of course. Even if he wasn't a person.

"Shinkai, stop humming and listen to me, god damn it!"

"What did you ask me again… Oh yeah, if it were you… if I had to… with you? I dunno… we're both guys…"

"That was the whole point!" Yasutomo exploded, grabbing Shinkai's shoulder and shaking him. "If you had to do it with a guy!"

_Why are we talking about this in a French camp site at three in the morning? Why are we talking about this when I'm tired and we should be sleeping and shit, Jinpachi is so going to lecture us tomorrow…_

"If I had to do it with a guy…" Shinkai was thinking. Or pretending to think. In reality, he was just trying to look like half of his brain wasn't sound asleep. "You're my… pal. I don't know… maybe. At least you're not... what did you say again... a chick?" Another burst of giggles erupted from his lips.

"Be quiet, you idiot!" Yasutomo hissed. "You're gonna wake up the others!"

_Hey, you're the one that started talking to me!_

Shinkai squeezed his lips together, but laughter broke through them. He burst right onto Yasutomo's face.

His black-haired mate straightened up to sit on Shinkai's hips, wiping his face with his sleeve. "Jesus, how can you still be so trashed?"

"I don't know." Shinkai kept snorting to himself for a moment, but his laughter lacked the energy and finally he grew too tired, sobering up a bit. "Can we… sleep? Now? Are you... happy?"

"I will hold you to that," Yasutomo said but climbed off of him, settling down into his own sleeping bag. Shinkai had an urge to ask what he was going to be held to, but he understood that it was very unlikely that he'd remember anything about their conversation in the morning. Besides, the more he kept talking to Yasutomo, the longer he had to stay awake. His tent buddy didn't say a word after that – or if he did, Shinkai couldn't hear it.


	9. Chapter 9

A/N: Again thank you everyone who commented or favourited! This chapter took me a bit longer because it's ~1000 words longer than the previous one.

* * *

**Chapter 9 – Weird conversations and hangovers**

~o~

"I'm not a virgin. When I turned sixteen, my grandma got me a prostitute to take care of the problem."

"Wha–?" Toudou was blinking and gaping, mute from astonishment. "Wait, what?"

Maki-chan snorted, his lips stretching into a wide grin. "Not really, but you should have seen your face."

"Maki-chan, that was cruel!" Toudou slapped his tent mate on the arm. God damn it, he had actually believed it for a second. Maki-chan was a really good liar. He had spoken with a totally serious face and sounded like even remembering the event was shameful.

"I was telling half of the truth, though", he said after that.

"What?"

Maki-chan exhaled, reaching behind his head with his hand. His fingers touched the tent fabric, fiddling with it, as his eyes slid to the ceiling. "Grandma did offer to get me a prostitute. Mom's side of the family has always been quite liberal."

Toudou raised his upper body up onto his elbows. "But you refused?"

"I refused. I don't know if she was actually serious in the end."

Maki-chan laughed a bit and Toudou joined him, because this time it was a natural laugh. Maybe not relaxed yet but clearly easier than those sarcastic snorts he let out when somebody was giving him a compliment.

It was around midnight. They had crawled into their tent at the same time as the rest, around half past ten, because everyone was so tired. Fuku had promised to stay up and wait for the two lost sheep, aka Shinkai and Arakita, to return. The day had been quite fun, in Toudou's opinion. Maki-chan had mostly been in a good mood the whole day, looking genuinely content after their swimming trip and late night snack. And after they had wrapped themselves in the sleeping bags, he had not immediately gone to sleep, but had started to talk to Toudou. Toudou never missed an opportunity to chat with his climber friend. And that's what they were still doing.

They had, in fact, quite a lot to talk about once Maki-chan got past his initial resistance. They had not only chatted about the trip but also about their families: Toudou had confessed that he didn't actually want to inherit his family's ryokan, and Maki-chan had told him about his older brother living in Great Britain. The conversation had stayed in a neutral zone, and therefore Toudou was absolutely not prepared when Maki-chan suddenly returned to his question from two weeks back.

Now, when they were finally talking about it, Toudou felt a serious jittering in the pit of his stomach, as if Maki-chan's status had especially mattered to him. Maybe he wanted Maki-chan to be a virgin, because then he wouldn't be the only one. The others he could never be sure of; he just didn't have the nerve to ask them.

Maki-chan sighed again, lifting his arm from beneath his head to rest over his eyes. "I am not though."

Toudou's heart stopped for ten seconds and then began to pound against his ribs at an increasing speed. Hotness splashed all over his face at the same time as his feet sunk into icy water. "What?"

The arm stayed in its place. "A virgin."

_Huh?_

_Okay. But... oh? Really? Hmm._

Toudou digested it for a moment. His heart's unruly hammering had become nausea in his gut.

_It doesn't matter. He's still Maki-chan._

But he couldn't help but look at his friend in a new light. If someone had asked him, he would have said that it was just a tiny bit wrong that Maki-chan had got rid of that burdensome stigma and he hadn't. After all, he was Toudou Jinpachi, one of the most popular guys in Hakogaku, if not _the_ most popular. And Maki-chan was… not so popular. Unsocial, reclusive and hard to approach. How on Earth had he gotten so close to a girl?

"How… When?" he managed to cough out, thankfully sounding almost normal.

"It was almost a year ago and I haven't been with anyone after that," Maki-chan muttered like he was embarrassed about it. A completely opposite attitude compared to the ones that Toudou's teammates had. "Almost as if it never happened."

"How so? Was it..?"

A laugh, this time a strained one. "No, it wasn't with a prostitute."

Toudou had a hunch that Maki-chan wanted to tell the story even if it wasn't his favourite. He took a better position, waiting patiently. His tent mate still rested his arm across his face.

"If I… I'm gonna tell you, Jinpachi, you can't…"

"I'm not going to tell anyone."

That made Maki-chan glance at him. Toudou tried to look like he could keep a state secret. And really, he could. He talked a lot in general but was able to keep his mouth shut when it was about someone else's important secret. Especially when it was about Maki-chan's secret. Because never before had Maki-chan confided in him.

Toudou wondered what had changed recently. Why was Maki-chan now so much more relaxed around him?

The blue eyes moved to the ceiling of the tent, not looking at him, but at least his arm returned onto the pillow, away from shadowing his face. Toudou was still waiting. The camping area was noisy around them. Judging by a distant basso rumble somebody was throwing a party. From the other side they could hear crickets chirping and birds singing. A faint wind made the fabric walls flutter. It was getting chilly; soon they'd have to crawl inside their sleeping bags.

"Like I said, it's been a year. Last fall…" Maki-chan trailed off to exhale and maybe to search for words. "Okay, so I and Kinjou and Tadokorocchi… after a race we went to this one party…"

Toudou kept thinking about why the story was so hard to tell. Couldn't Maki-chan just say that he had picked up a girl and spent the night at her place? Or that they'd just gone to the backroom of the party house. Or in the bushes. Or where ever they had…

_You don't have to tell me._

He wasn't stupid enough to blurt his thoughts out loud. He wanted to hear. He couldn't recall when he'd last wanted to hear something so badly. But a hint of nausea was still lurking in his throat. He could only hope that he looked calm.

"And as the night progressed, this… person came to me and… okay, I was a bit drunk and probably so were they and… or not 'probably', they were drunk." A shrug. "And then things took a wrong turn."

"Why a wrong turn?"

"I don't know, it just didn't feel right. Maybe I'm more of those guys who want to know the other person before…"

Toudou had no idea why hearing this made him feel warm inside.

"Who was she?" he asked, trying to sound like he was flooding with empathy. "I mean, did you know her before that? Was she a cycling club fan?" _How did you manage to lure that girl in bed with you? What did you say? What did you do?_

It sounded more like the girl had initiated it. Where could you find such girls? Like outside of a brothel.

Maki-chan relaxed his neck, making his head roll onto the left cheek, towards Toudou. "Can you _really_ keep a secret?"

"Of course I can," Toudou assured, inhaling sharply right after that. "Shit! It was that Kanzaki's little sister, wasn't it? What was she called again? Miki?" Wasn't she a first-year? Or last fall she had still been in middle school. No wonder Maki-chan was a bit embarrassed about the subject.

As a result he got an extremely tight, extremely awkward laugh. "No, it definitely wasn't her."

"Are you sure?"

Maki-chan glared at him long and hard. Alright, so maybe that had been a stupid question.

"Well, who was it then?"

"You don't know them. I hadn't met them before – and not afterwards, for that matter."

"Come on, give me something, Maki-chan! Was the girl the same age as us? Younger, older?"

His friend cleared his throat. "The thing is… that person wasn't exactly… a girl."

Wasn't a girl? What? What decrepit granny had Maki-chan done the dirty with? Toudou had sworn to himself that he'd stay compassionate but if Maki-chan really had slept with some middle-aged hag–

Oh.

Maki-chan was looking at him, trying to figure out from his facial expressions if he had understood or if he had to spell it out.

He didn't. Toudou had understood. Or at least he was 99.9 percent sure that he had understood. But if just one simple, tiny question…

"So that girl was… a _guy_?"

Hmm, perhaps he could have phrased it more eloquently. His verbal skills had experienced a lot of headwind lately.

Maki-chan let out yet another laugh, which sounded more like a hyena's bark this time. It was full of irony – self-irony – and hearing it made Toudou's stomach twitch. Why did Maki-chan always have to think about himself so negatively?

_You thought about him negatively just now. You were musing about how he had managed to get intimate with someone, given that he is so unpopular. __Do you even know how popular he actually is?_

Toudou silenced his inner moralist. At the moment he wanted to concentrate on the conversation. Later there would be time to think about whether it was morally right or not to boost your self-confidence at the cost of your friends.

"Do I need to answer that?" Maki-chan asked.

"Well, if you're not denying it, I almost have to assume…"

"Yes, Toudou, that girl was a guy."

So they were back on surname terms.

Toudou opened his mouth to say something, but words slipped from his grasp. What were you even supposed to say in a situation like this? 'Congratulations'? 'I'm sorry'? He also wanted to ask if it had been a single slip and a horrible experience specifically because the other party had been a guy, or just because of mismatched personalities or such things. Actually, he wanted to ask if Maki-chan was...

Before he managed to decide which comment would suit the situation best, his tongue threw away the filter and started firing indiscretions: "What the hell is that gravure hobby of yours then?"

Maki-chan peeked at him. "It's a hobby."

"But I mean, it includes… half-naked girls and if you–"

"Shh, Toudou, we're in a tent, not in a hotel room."

Reluctantly, Toudou lowered his voice. "Do you look at half-naked dudes that way too? Do you have guy catalogues?"

"No, I don't. And don't start thinking that I'd want to… grope you or your teammates or something."

"I wouldn't think that," Toudou said quickly. And it was true. Maki-chan kept his distance more strictly than any other person that Toudou had come across.

He mused about whether or not the revelation bothered him or not. His body was recovering from the fall that it had taken after Maki-chan had told him that he had already left the behind the burden of virginity. And right after that he dropped a bomb like this. For some reason Toudou wasn't especially shocked. Surprised yes, but he was slowly becoming himself again. His heart was still beating a bit too fast and he was slightly shivering but that could be due to the chilly air.

Just a moment ago he had thought that Maki-chan was Maki-chan even if he wasn't a virgin anymore. But what if he was…interested in guys? Would Toudou still see his long-time rival in the same way?

Then it suddenly dawned on him how massive the secret that Maki-chan had revealed to him was, and a spark of pride jolted in his chest. Did this mean that he was in Maki-chan's coterie?

"Does anyone else know?" he asked.

"Only Kinjou and Tadokorocchi."

Wow, okay. Toudou would have imagined that the bull had somewhat old-fashioned opinions about same-sex relationships, but even if he had prejudices, it didn't show in his behaviour towards Maki-chan. In fact, Tadokoro seemed to be the closest with Sohoku's ace climber.

"And now me," Toudou couldn't resist adding.

"And now you." Maki-chan flashed him a lopsided smile. He was getting a hold of himself again. He pushed his arm under the pillow, lifting his head and letting out the breath he'd been holding. His chest fell what looked like ten centimeters.

"Then how come the experience was… so bad?"

"Because I didn't know the guy and it was a drunken experiment. Didn't really get much out of it."

Toudou had read about it. First times were often full of wavering, insecurity, fumbling and all kinds of embarrassing occurrences, such as premature ejaculations, losing of erection, using a condom incorrectly, _forgetting_ a condom and god knows what.

Maybe he shouldn't rush his project after all. Maybe it would be better if he got to know the girl a bit before jumping into bed with her. It would be utterly unbearable if he lost his erection right in the middle of action. What would that do to his reputation?

He wanted to pry for details, such as what exactly Maki-chan had done with the other guy, but he reckoned that he wouldn't get an answer. Maki-chan had already stretched his limits by trusting Toudou with such a heavy secret. He felt like touching his friend, maybe patting him on the shoulder encouragingly but that would probably make Maki-chan turn in on himself. He only tolerated touching when he was the one to initiate it.

But had he tolerated it back then when that… that guy had approached him?

"I'm not going to tell anyone," Toudou assured him once more. "And it doesn't bother me. If that's what you're thinking."

Maki-chan peeked at him out of the corner of his eye. "I was pretty sure it wouldn't bother you."

Toudou didn't know whether to be even more proud or to wonder what Maki-chan actually meant with his comment. Did he think that Toudou was fashionably liberal? Or that his morale was so loose that even a certain marquis back in the 18th century couldn't match him?

Why was he even thinking about it?

Instead, he should have been thinking of what to say to his friend when he would inevitably ask about Toudou's experiences. Should he tell the truth or babble vague crap about overly-affectionate fans who tried to jump his bones immediately after he got off his bike?

"Well, that's about it," Maki-chan said, yawning. It looked faked. "Should we get some sleep now? It's been quite a long day again."

In Toudou's gut, relief intertwined with disappointment. Didn't even Maki-chan want to know what his status was?

"Unless you have..." Maki-chan suddenly continued. "..something you want to share?"

"Umm… I suppose that can wait. I'm pretty tired too," Toudou heard himself say. Sometimes he felt like a walking paradox.

"Alright then." There was a rustle of fabric as Maki-chan tugged his arms inside the sleeping bag, to shelter them from the cold. "I should warn you though: if you're a light sleeper, it could become a burden on this trip."

His words were echoed by a piercing, abrasive, thorough _nose-completely-stuffed-up-and-the-other-airways-full-of-glue_ rattling. His face was probably mirroring his shock as Maki-chan chuckled.

"Kinjou manages to shut him up. Sometimes."

"What about Mr. Pierre? How can he sleep with so much noise?" Toudou suspected that the thin tent fabric didn't muffle the snoring at all.

"Nah, the old man has selective hearing. He can block out any disturbing noise."

"That's an enviable talent." Toudou wrote himself a mental note to purchase earplugs, otherwise sleeping could become a challenge.

"Besides, I'm under the impression that he snores too."

"Poor Kinjou."

"These kinds of obstacles only help him with his mind controlling practises."

"You don't say." _But what about the rest of us?_

They were quiet for a while. The silence wasn't awkward like Toudou would have anticipated after their discussions. Perhaps they were just too tired. Maki-chan had chosen a perfect time for his revelation.

The person in question just turned onto his side inside his sleeping bag, his back towards Toudou, like he always seemed to lie, taking a deep breath. "Now go to sleep, Toudou."

"Aye aye, captain." Toudou laid down on his back, arranging his pillow properly under his head and zipping up his sleeping bag. The air was still full of noise, animal sounds, basso thumping and most piercingly, Tadokoro's ground shattering snore. And steps as someone walked across the grass patch just outside their tent. Fuku who had to wait for Shinkai and Arakita.

Toudou closed his eyes, trying to block out the noise. In fact, it was easier now when there was a full cacophony of them; they blended in with each other. A lonely sound in the middle of the silence would have been more disturbing. Even so, he hoped that Tadokoro would snore just a few decibels lower.

"Maki-chan, wasn't the bull at least a bit judgemental when you told him you had been swapping gravies with a rump ranger?"

"Oh my god, Toudou, shut up!"

Toudou smirked to himself before closing his eyes and resuming his hunt for sleep again.

* * *

The dawning day threw at least one peculiar detail in front of them.

Shinkai and Arakita had a hangover.

"How is that possible?" Toudou asked. He had just returned from the bathrooms along with seven other members of their troupe and was ready to jump into the car. It would have been nice to get a bite to eat before that, but Mr. Pierre had suggested that they buy breakfast on their way to the watching spot, as now it was important to take off soon. Everyone else was pretty much ready to leave, but then two squinty-eyed zombies crawled (after Fuku's command) out of the last tent. "It's the first day of the Tour and you're hung over. Well, Arakita doesn't really surprise me, but I expected more from you, Hayato."

Arakita rubbed his bloodshot eyes. "Shut the fuck up, Toudou. Your bleating hurts my brain."

Shinkai was in a much worse condition than his pal. His red hair was sweaty and ruffled, his face was ash grey and his eyes that were usually so big had narrowed into knife slits. The gaze showing from between his lids was turned in, towards the nausea bubbling beneath his skin. His clothes, the same as yesterday, were hanging on his frame, wrinkled. He held his head in his hands, breathing deeply in order to balance the swaying of his stomach. A resilient trail of drool was sneaking down his lower lip; one of those that anticipated vomiting. Soon he'd start to hang his tongue out like in his infamous straight-line demon mode.

In the middle of all the astonishment, Manami stepped in front of the duo and snapped a picture of them with his phone. Arakita let out a roar, leaping towards the punk, but Manami had slept better than him and was quick to escape. He even laughed while running, that insufferable imp. Onoda looked like he was about to wet his pants out of terror. Arakita's rage had that kind of impact on older people too, let alone a first-year otaku who'd probably grown up in the back room of his house.

"Don't worry, Four-eyes," Toudou said, laying his hand on the boy's shoulder. "Manami is fast."

Arakita soon gave up because running around apparently made his head pound twice as hard and Manami simply had the ability to defy gravity. He had already leaped over the hedgerow to delight the occupants of their neighbouring camp.

"Why the hell did you decide to go and drink your asses off even though you knew that we have an early wake up call?" Toudou couldn't resist asking.

"Because I don't get hung over if I go to bed early enough," Arakita huffed, wiping black hair out of his face. "But this time Shinkai laughed through the night so I couldn't get any sleep."

"I reckon it was that grandpa who snored," Naruko pointed out.

"Are you tired of living, midget?!" Tadokoro bellowed. Naruko retreated quickly, lifting his hands in submission.

"I didn't laugh," Shinkai managed to groan. "You were the one clinging onto my ba– _mmphh!_"

Toudou had never seen Arakita move so quickly, not even on a bike, when he attacked Shinkai and slammed his hand over his mouth. First Shinkai struggled out of sheer surprise but gave in soon after realizing he had been attacked by a teammate and not a bandit looking for hostages.

Waving his free hand, Arakita began pushing Shinkai towards the path. "Cheers, suckers! We're gonna go and throw up now." After that, the duo started staggering towards the bathrooms, Arakita determined and Shinkai hanging half-limp in his grasp.

The others were left to stand on the camping spot, blinking, stupefied. What exactly had happened just now?

"Come back as soon as you can," Fuku recovered enough to shout after the two problem children. "We need to get going if we hope to get a good spot."

Both the camping area and the road passing in front of it had been busy the whole morning. People were packing their stuff and climbing into their cars. Everything foreshadowed the arrival of the Tour.

"We're not staying in the city," Mr. Pierre said. "The streets have been crowded since sunrise and we can't get in the close vicinity. We'll drive to the countryside to wait there. But we have to leave now before they close down some of the streets and the traffic gets jammed."

However much of a nutcase Mr. Pierre was, bringing him along had been the best idea of the year. They would have been completely lost without a person who knew the language and the customs of the country – and apparently even the geography, too. The old man gave away an impression that this wasn't his first Tour.

"Let's pack the tents and get in the car," Kinjou ordered, and everyone went to carry out the actions. Everyone else except Mr. Barfly 1 and 2, who had once again escaped the camp site tasks.

They ended up sitting in almost the same places as before. The only difference was that because it would be hard for Shinkai and Arakita to squeeze themselves to the back of the car in a narrow, fully packed aisle and anyway it was sensible to place them next to a door, Teshima and Aoyagi moved to the back row and the booze duo would be seated closest to the door, next to Tadokoro and Kinjou. Toudou and Maki-chan were on the same row as Naruko and Imaizumi again. The redhead was really _too much_ of a morning person, on a scale that even Toudou couldn't match, so thankfully they wouldn't have to drive for longer than half an hour.

The car was packed and ready to go. They drove up to the bathrooms and Fuku hopped out, marching off to fetch their two missing members.

"Seriously," Toudou sighed as he leaned against Maki-chan's side. "Arakita is usually the first person to complain about delays. If we miss a good spot because of them…" He couldn't even come up with a proper punishment. Not even a month's cleaning duty in the club room sounded like it was justified enough. The atmosphere in the car was strained, as everyone was upset about the delay to some extent (even if the delay wasn't yet worth mentioning, maybe five minutes or so) but nobody complained. Not even Naruko but probably only because he had once again engaged himself in argument with Imaizumi.

"Let's just leave them a note and go. We can come back to get them after we've seen the Tour once the roads are again open," Tadokoro said from in front of Toudou. This time he agreed with the bull. That would teach them a lesson. What the hell had they been thinking? Arakita had a bad influence on Shinkai.

"Hayato is not usually like that," he said, feeling a need to defend his teammate that he liked a lot more than the other one. Maki-chan peeked at him over his shoulder, shaking his head slightly as if to say that if this had been the first impression of the whiskey crusaders, it would have taken a couple of years to repair it. Although, with Arakita, the first impression had probably been quite bad from the start.

Maki-chan had been surprisingly normal the whole morning. And so had Toudou. They had woken up at seven, gotten dressed, gone to the bathrooms to wash up, packed their tent and collected their stuff. One time Maki-chan had looked at him for a second too long through his green bangs, as if to ask if they were okay. Toudou had nodded and they had resumed their packing. That was all.

And that was how Toudou wanted it to be. He wanted Maki-chan to know that he could be trusted with secrets and that they wouldn't change the way he regarded his friends.

"Finally," he huffed, spotting Fuku walk towards the car with the hangover twins at his heels. Even if Shinkai had been able to walk on his own, he wasn't given a chance to try, as Arakita had thrown his arm over his own shoulders and was practically dragging his teammate along. The trio hopped in the car and Mr. Pierre drove them out of the camping area.

If the car had reeked like stale cola yesterday, now it smelled like old booze. Toudou would have preferred the former. He was pinching his nose and waving his hand in front of his face. "Dear lord above, do not breathe this way."

"Zip it, bitch," Arakita said politely.

There were cars on the streets, even a couple of small traffic jams too, but they were able to drive at a decent speed. Although at the moment when there started to be less buildings and more of field scenery, it was made clear that _a few other people_ had come to see the Tour, too. But then Mr. Pierre turned to a sideway and they could increase their speed remarkably.

"Along this road there's a nice small coffee kiosk," the man explained. "We can buy our snacks there – and coffee for those who need it. We can take the small roads to get very close to our destination, and even if we have to stop there, we can leave the car and just walk to the route of the Tour."

So it was settled. They weren't even in a hurry anymore, so once they reached the kiosk, they had a generous amount of time to decide what to buy. Mr. Pierre and Kinjou sat on the patio to drink coffee. Nobody helped poor Shinkai out of the car; Arakita only asked him harshly what he wanted to eat and jumped out before Shinkai could form a proper sentence. Hmph, if Arakita didn't buy anything to eat for Shinkai, Toudou would.

Inside, Arakita hogged himself half a litre of coffee and a bottle of Bepsi.

"Is that your breakfast?" Toudou asked.

Arakita threw him a glance that could roughly be translated as: 'You have three seconds to close your trap, you whining biddy, before I rip your favourite shirt and sew your lips together with its thread.' Toudou sneered, moving further away, but he still made sure that Arakita bought some grub to Shinkai as well.

They returned to the car with piles of snacks and bottles and the journey continued. Though it continued for only three minutes before they heard the first sign of discord, oddly enough, not from Naruko this time.

"I'm hungry," Shinkai groaned. As nobody reacted, he repeated his lament after a couple of minutes. And then again. And then again. Toudou had never seen Shinkai so... un-Shinkai-like.

"Somebody give the starving whiner some food," ordered Tadokoro.

"Don't give him anything," Arakita forbade them, nudging Shinkai to straighten up his form. "He'll fucking puke all over the seats if he eats something. He can wait until the watching spot."

Shinkai wiped his sweaty, deathly-pale face. "Jesus Christ…"

"You should drink a lot if you have a hangover," Toudou said, and picked up a bottle of mineral water which he passed to into Shinkai's limply hanging hand. Perhaps carbonic acids would calm the carousel in his stomach. "I solely blame you for this, Arakita."

"I didn't drink that booze for him."

"But you incited him to."

"It was his own fault."

Shinkai fumbled with the cap before he managed to open it, and took several small sips out of the bottle. For a moment, he looked better and seemed to continue his dehydration but Arakita snatched the bottle from him and for some reason named himself as his teammate's drink keeper.

"You should have done that yesterday," Toudou muttered. The atmosphere calmed down though because the hangover duo leaned against the seats, planning to get some more sleep.

After fifteen minutes of driving in some periphery, Mr. Pierre slowed down, turned the car to a narrow sand road and stopped. There were other cars parked on the side of the road too, so it was probably a good place to leave the car.

"We're here!" the old man announced. "Take your stuff so we can go and find ourselves a spot by the racing route. The racers will ride past sometime after the noon. There will be more people coming but it shouldn't be crowded like in the city."

They gathered their stuff and started walking towards the crossing road. The view mostly consisted of fields and meadows against distant rows of trees, but here and there they could see cars and caravans, and some people were already arranging camping chairs on the side of the road. It was only nine o'clock. They had a several-hours wait ahead of them before the racers would pass their spot. But they had a lot of food and drinks and the day seemed to become sunny. Some sort of sunshade would have been nice to have too.

Toudou pointed at a big oak, the only one in the close vicinity. It was just by the road, so close that it would serve as a perfect watching spot if other people didn't line up in front of them. "Let's go and sit under that tree so we'll have some shade."

They spread out on their chosen place, attacking their breakfast. Toudou had brought his sleeping bag pad and he laid it on the ground in the shadow of the tree. Maki-chan sat next to him before he even had time to ask, but unfortunately he wasn't the only one. Fuku and Izumida sat on his other side. Toudou hoped that Arakita would keep some distance, because, in all honesty, he reeked like a pirate that had gone deep diving in a barrel of rum. He didn't need to worry though, as Arakita dropped his own pad two meters away and began arranging his drinking buddy on it. Commands accompanied by swearing were flying in the air; it sounded like he was trying to give orders to a very obstinate dog. Toudou knew that Arakita's family had a dog. Was this how he talked to the poor animal too? Although, now it looked more like as he was trying to make a rag doll obey his commands. Shinkai was still in pretty bad shape. Next time he'd probably think twice before downing such amount of booze. After some long and hard labour, Arakita had apparently gotten Shinkai into a desired position, because the swearing ceased and their little camp became peacefully quiet.

They managed to sit under the tree and enjoy the warm morning with their snacks only for a few minutes, before Shinkai scrambled to his feet, staggered further away from the road and noisily threw up all over the grass field.

* * *

A/N: Shinkai doesn't handle a hangover that well. Could someone maybe draw the picture Manami took? :D

Damn, Maki-chan's revelation was hard to write! In Finnish we don't have gender specific pronouns, just one for both male and female, so Maki's talking didn't originally sound at all suspicious but now it just sounds like Toudou is really slow. Oh well.


	10. Chapter 10

A/N: I got such a nice review but unfortunately it was from a guest so I can't answer it personally. :-/ Anyway, I want to thank you who left that nice review, it really made my day! And thank you for everyone else commenting or favouriting, too. Sorry, I've been a bit lazy posting here (I usually post first on AO3) so after this I have another chapter ready for publishing.

There will be quite a lot of Shinara in the near future. It's because in this fic Shinkai's and Arakita's relationship works so differently from Toudou and Maki that I have to get the boys going soon. But Toumaki fans, don't worry, they will get their screen time and have time to develop their relationship. :)

* * *

**Chapter 10 – Solidarity between guys**

~o~

One of the best features of road racing was the intensity of it. The speed, the effort, the pain, sweat and strategies, giving it your everything. And from the watchers' point of view the moment when after a long wait the first racers appeared in the horizon – and how they just zipped past and disappeared. It hardly lasted a minute even if you were standing by a long, straight road. But then the next bunch emerged and you could relive the moment. That was the spirit of road racing.

They had gotten excellent spots. Even though more people had showed up, they had managed to keep their patch beside the tree and it wasn't even crowded yet. The weather was sunny and clear, not too hot, and a faint breeze was making the dry hay swish. All in all, it was an ideal way to start watching the Tour.

Shinkai just hoped that he'd feel a bit better at the moment that the cars leading the race came into view.

The worst storm had passed after he had thrown up for the third time (at that moment there had already been a lot of people around and most evidently he had provided the opening act of the day) but his head was still hurting like someone had pounded it with a hammer. Rays of sunlight drilled straight into his brain. He had arranged a pair of sunglasses on his nose but they hadn't helped him enough, so to his utter shame he had been forced to borrow one of Mr. Pierre's coffee filter hats. He reckoned that the rest of his life would be spent listening to Yasutomo's mocking.

Although, Shinkai would rather that Yasutomo mocked him for the hat and not for what he had blurted out yesterday. _With Gackt?!_ Just what had been going on inside his head?

_Well, a fair amount of alcohol, to start with._

His recollection of memories had been cracked from the moment that they had left the bar. Somehow they had made it back to the camp, and he had slept in the tent instead of on the side of the road. But there was a nagging feeling, hinting that he'd said yet something else, something that he really should remember. And sometimes, when he looked at Yasutomo, that something tried to crawl onto stage from the back corner of his brain. Yasutomo kept glancing at him in a weird way but maybe only because he caught Shinkai staring at him with a deep frown.

He managed to push his hangover aside when the excitement rose amongst the audience and people started cheering. The enthusiasm of the crowd was engrossing – he had expected their group to cheer, wave, jump and clap – but, as it turned out, every one of them was quiet, stunned into silence. The air was thick with emotions. Next to Shinkai, Yasutomo was breathing heavily, and on his other side he could sense Juichi's muscles tensing up. He could see Jinpachi hanging onto Makishima's arm like his life depended on it, but Sohoku's climber was so absorbed with the race that he failed to notice the abuse of his limb.

It was almost ironic that the freshmen were the first ones to recover.

"That bike! Look at it! I want one just like that! Ooh, what a babe! Give it to me!"

Tadokoro had to hold Sohoku's younger sprinter as he was about to bolt into the road. If someone had lived until that day believing that there was a greater love in Naruko Shoukichi's life than bicycles, this was the moment that the illusion crumbled down.

"Try to keep your pants on, you wacky midget, you're embarrassing us!" Tadokoro ordered but his voice was also wavering with emotion.

As the peloton had ridden past, more than one member of their troop had tears on their cheeks. With Jinpachi it had been inevitable, but Juichi wasn't the first person that Shinkai would have bet on to weep. And he didn't weep per se, but secretly wiped the corners of his eyes.

The next burst of emotions followed, as Arashiro rode past. One would have thought that there wouldn't have been a crumb of control left after the first wave, but they still found themselves hanging right beside the road. And at that point the cheering gear kicked in, too.

Maybe Arashiro heard his countrymen shout – because it wasn't the most intensive phase of the stage and it was possible for racers to take a look at their surroundings – or maybe he just happened to glance to his right but he lifted his hand, waving at them.

"Someone catch Toudou! He's passing out!" Yasutomo hollered.

"Shut up, you just creamed your pants!" Jinpachi hissed, but his balance did seem a little off and he was still hanging onto Makishima for support.

"Oh, I thought that was Naruko."

The person in question was so dazed that he let the insult slide. In fact, he was _so_ dazed that Shinkai wouldn't have been surprised to see a wet spot in the front of his pants.

Okay, so every one of them loved cycling and amazing road racers, there was no doubt about it. But none of them loved bicycles _quite_ as much as Naruko Shoukichi. That had become clear during those few days that they had spent in the close vicinity of Sohoku's little sprinter.

"Do you see Andy or Fränk?"

"Hah, imagine if Izumida had a chance to meet the guys," Yasutomo said. "And he told them he'd named his pecs after them."

"You could ask them to sign your pecs," Jinpachi added.

Izumida's face got somewhat red and he stayed quiet. Unfortunately they didn't spot the Schleck brothers. But maybe in the next stage.

Seeing Arashiro was probably the finest moment of the first day, after all he was one of the few Japanese cyclists to have ever finished the Tour. To Shinkai it felt like he couldn't see anything for a moment after Arashiro had disappeared from view.

Eventually the road quietened and the cars driving behind the last racers passed them. People started to scatter around. Their troupe walked slowly back to the car to eat what was left of their snacks. The plan was to have a light lunch and then drive to Tours. The next day's stage would start there.

They unpacked the snacks from the car, spreading out a couple of picnic blankets for their lunch. It was moments like this when you noticed the dynamics and friendships of the group. In Sohoku's camp, the third-years settled down to eat amongst themselves, while the second-years formed their own little group as did the first-years. Mr. Pierre had slumped down into a camp chair, his filter hat over his eyes and seemed to have dozed off in a record of time. Amongst Hakogaku, the third-years were usually inseparable but that had been before there was anyone from Sohoku present. Therefore everyone was a bit surprised when Jinpachi suddenly joined them. As did Izumida, but somewhere between the last batch of cyclists and setting up a picnic their youngest member had disappeared.

"Where's that cursed gnome now?" Yasutomo asked.

"I don't know, the last time I saw him was when Arashiro rode past," Jinpachi said.

Yasutomo clicked his tongue in disapproval. "Maybe we should leave him here. That would teach him to stay with the group."

"Mhm, we were going to do the same thing to you back at the camping area."

"What?!"

"It took you so long."

"Dude was _barfing_!" Yasutomo pointed at Shinkai. "Should I have ripped him off the toilet in the middle of it?"

"You shouldn't have been drinking yesterday!"

"Sorry, Jinpachi," Shinkai muttered. His teammate was right. Their timing had been utterly lowsy. It was incredible how thoroughly his self-control had failed him.

"If you're just gonna lecture us, you can move to Sohoku's camp," Yasutomo growled.

"Well, everything worked out in the end," Izumida tried to calm them down. "Shinkai-san and Arakita-san got out in time and we found a good spot to watch."

Jinpachi huffed to himself, crossing his arms. "Barely."

"No, it wasn't 'barely'. We got here hours before the Tour," Yasutomo remarked. After that, Juichi cleared his throat and the arguing ceased.

It wasn't much of a lunch, because they were meant to eat better at their next stop but Shinkai downed every piece of food that he got out of the picnic bag. Hunger had been mauling at him the whole morning but nausea had prevented him from eating and this was probably the first time in ten years that he had skipped breakfast. He gobbled two sandwiches filled with ham, cheese and salad, a croissant, two oranges, a banana and three energy bars and would have eaten even more if the others had not hogged their share of the bag. Yasutomo had borrowed (or perhaps snatched) a thermos from Mr. Pierre and he poured Shinkai some strong, black coffee. His headache started to slowly dissipate.

"After the 15th stage, it's a resting day," Jinpachi said, his tone relented. "It's on the 15th, your birthday, Hayato. Shouldn't we celebrate it?"

"Hmm, yeah." Shinkai hadn't forgotten his birthday – after all, it wasn't every day that a person turned eighteen – but the excitement from the Tour had forced his birthday to take a backseat.

"Let's just stick a candle in a choco-banana PowerBar. That'd make a suitable cake."

"Arakita, you're so rude that I keep wondering how Hayato still has the patience to look at your impolite face. We'll definitely come up with something better than an energy bar cake. Let's see where we will be then…" Jinpachi fished a folded map of the Tour out of his pocket, opening it with a very self-important look on his face. "A place called Mont Ventoux. Maybe there'll be some nice restaurants or other places we could visit. I wonder if it has an amusement park."

"Mont Ventoux is a mountain," Izumida said. "It's completely bare. There's nothing there, hardly even plants."

"Oh yeah, right. Damn. Well, maybe there's a village or something close by. Isn't France quite a populous country? Hey, maybe on that resting day we could rent bikes and go for a ride!" Jinpachi turned to look at Shinkai and Yasutomo, his gaze stern. "Barring that on the night of the 14th you won't disappear to get yourselves shitfaced."

Seriously, the world lost a great mother hen in Jinpachi.

* * *

Their next accommodation was a tiny camping area about twenty kilometers from Tours. In fact, it was so tiny that it was a miracle that they had managed to book a spot. Maybe Mr. Pierre knew the owners. The old man stopped the car in the shadow of trees. Patches weren't outlined clearly but on both of their sides there were caravans so it was easy to make out their spot.

Some of them started to set up the tents right away, because they were still planning to go and have dinner somewhere close. Shinkai sat down in the shadow of a tree to enjoy the day's third cup of coffee. He wasn't really a coffee drinker but for a hangover the bitter drink worked wonders. While sitting there, he fished his phone out of his pocket, where it had been lying the whole day. He just hadn't remembered to check it since yesterday.

Whoops. There was a collection of new messages waiting for him again.

_'Hayato, where are you now? Did you get to see the Tour yet?'_

'_Did you see the Tour? What was it like?'_

'_Huh, it's actually really weird to not hear from you for a long time. Sure there's the time difference but shouldn't it be almost noon in France now? Text me when you have a moment.'_

They had been messaging last night and even though it seemed to have been a forever ago, in reality only 20 hours had past, most of them spent sleeping. What was Ayane's problem? She had always been very eager to text and call him, but Shinkai had clearly stated that he couldn't use his phone constantly during his trip. He was almost scared to open the last message.

'_Hayato, where the hell are you? I'm getting worried!'_

"Hey, dude." Yasutomo halted next to him and poked him lightly in the shoulder. "What's up? Feeling better?"

"Sort of. Still tired though," he said. He felt immensely better, having eaten, downed a couple of litres of water and some coffee on top of it, but he'd need a good night sleep to feel properly alive again. Luckily he'd been able to remove his ridiculous headwear.

"Mhm, same here." Yasutomo pulled a scrunched L&M pack out of his pocket, shaking a cigarette onto his palm. "Wanna bet on for how many seconds I can manage to smoke this before Toudou comes to lecture me?"

Shinkai chuckled. "Jinpachi seems to be quite busy elsewhere at the moment." Apparently their climber princess had decided that he had fulfilled his duties towards his own team and had glued himself to Makishima again. Sohoku's climber was trying to set up their tent, and instead of helping out, Jinpachi was tugging his sleeve and babbling about something Shinkai luckily couldn't hear to his spot. Makishima listened, looking more or less suffering. And people said about Shinkai that he had the nerves of a cow!

"Just watch." Yasutomo clicked the lighter under his cigarette, taking a first drag. Smoke enveloped them in the windless evening. "Well, what do you think about the first day of the Tour?"

Shinkai answered with a wide smile. Words felt insufficient, too light to describe the feeling that seeing the Tour had left them with. Everyone seemed to suffer from the same problem. Throughout the day, they had talked about it and every now and then someone had brought up a new detail about the race. Remarks about how someone had ridden, what kind of bike he'd had, how the rest of the audience had reacted. 'Fucking amazing,' Yasutomo had said and it was pretty much to come from him, but it – like all the other comments – still sounded like… like someone had ordered a small ball of vanilla in the world's most luxurious ice cream café.

"If you wait for a couple of hours, I'll compose a symphony of this day."

His teammate smirked. "What are you going to name it? Cycling symphonies in a hangover falsetto?"

"Perhaps. Would you agree to sing in them?"

"If you're looking for some horror elements."

"Come on, your voice is not that bad."

Yasutomo snorted. "You should recruit Fuku-chan. You'd get some opera in your symphony."

Shinkai let out a laugh. The only time they had actually lured Juichi into singing, the results had been quite memorable, mostly because Juichi sung as he lived. Honourably. And because judging by his singing style he had only listened to opera until that day.

"Yeah, Juichi would undeniably fit in it."

They chuckled in companionable understanding.

"Maybe we'll get there some day," Yasutomo said. "Y'know, the Tour."

"Maybe." Shinkai wondered if he'd have time to train at a university. He should definitely pick a school that provided the chance to continue his hobby. "By the way, where's Manami? Did we leave him back at the watching spot?"

"Nah, Toudou reached him with his phone. He's probably sleeping in the back of the van right now."

"Okay." Shinkai really had no relationship with Manami whatsoever and the boy caused his troubles all by himself, but they shouldn't just leave him somewhere in France's periphery.

He ate his last energy bar, rinsing it down with coffee. After that, he got his phone out again, starting to type his reply to Ayane. She would literally climb the walls and maybe call Shinkai's parents if she didn't hear from him soon.

'_Sorry, I haven't had time to answer because we've been on the road the whole day. It's that sort of a trip. Can't really call it a holiday. We saw the Tour, it was really great. Now we're in a camping area again near Tours and tomorrow we'll go to the city early to get a good spot for watching. Please don't get worried even if you don't hear from me every day.' _

The last sentence was useless. Ayane was the worrying kind.

He almost felt like shutting off his phone to avoid making an extra bill but that would make Ayane totally freak out. Besides, it was good to be available in case his folks needed something.

Yasutomo sat with his knees bent, leaning his arms onto them, taking a drag out of his cigarette now and then and watching Shinkai type out of the corner of his eye. Shinkai had a feeling that he wanted to say something, but he had the patience to wait until Shinkai had sent his message and stuffed his phone back into his pocket.

"So… have you had a chance to consider my suggestion?"

Shinkai turned to look at his black-haired mate. What frigging suggestion?

Aargh, he knew that he had been left in the dark about something from yesterday!

"You practically already agreed," Yasutomo added, and to Shinkai it seemed that he was trying to pretend to be more careless than he actually was: the cigarette on the lips, a slight inhale, puffing out the smoke, a casual glance from between his half-closed lids.

It was getting better yet. He had promised to do something that he had no recollection of.

He tried to rummage through his mind. They had sat on the patio, downed some cider, beer and finally the shots, talked bullshit about women and Jinpachi and his relationship with Makishima. But he couldn't remember having promised anything.

"Remind me," he said.

Yasutomo shook his head. "Let's talk about it later."

"Why later?"

Yasutomo nodded towards the tents. "Toudou is coming this way."

Oh yeah, he was, actually. And he was stamping his feet while marching up to them, making the grass fall like it was cut with a trimmer. His hands were clenched in fists, his brows pressing heavily down onto his eyes.

He stopped in front of them, crossing his arms.

"Arakita, _what_ are you doing?"

"I'm sitting in a French camp site and enjoying the warm evening."

"You. Are. Smoking!"

Yasutomo lifted the cigarette to eye level, raising his brows as if he'd only now noticed it for the first time. "Lo and behold! So it seems."

"Do you have any idea what that stick of cancer is doing to your body? To your cycling condition?"

"I do. That's why I'm just going to finish this pack and not buy a new one. What happens in France, stays in France."

Jinpachi didn't look convinced. "How many are there left in the pack?"

"Mm, seven."

"It's seven too many. Your lungs will turn into chimneys. Give that pack to me!" Jinpachi, who had never understood the concept of personal space, tried to sneak his fingers inside Yasutomo's breast pocket. Yasutomo just slapped the hand away and resumed his smoking.

Jinpachi's face got flushed with anger. "Give me those cigarettes!"

"No. I'll smoke them during the trip."

"I will tell Fuku."

"Be my guest."

Jinpachi stomped away at least as theatrically as he had arrived, with determination and huffing and puffing to himself. Shinkai felt a smile tug his lips, though on the other hand, he actually understood Jinpachi. Competitive sports wasn't just a hobby, it was a way of life. Your daily choices had to be taken into account, whether it was about how many hours you slept or what you put into your mouth. But their all had their weaknesses: Juichi had apple pies, Shinkai had choco-banana bars, Manami was a slob to the core. Probably even Jinpachi sometimes hogged fast food when he was alone. Izumida was the only one of them with a samurai's self-discipline.

Yasutomo had his Bepsi. And he was a bit lazy, though it was nothing in comparison to Manami. He was right too; a few cigarettes wouldn't ruin his condition, as long as smoking didn't become a habit.

Yasutomo didn't bring up his suggestion anymore, but it looked like it was still bugging him. Hell, it was bugging Shinkai too. Because he saw himself as a man who kept his promise. That is, if he had promised something. It sounded more like Yasutomo had come up a crazy idea, for example, he had suggested that they would dress up as sheep for the graduation party, and Shinkai had agreed in his drunken state.

He brought it up himself when they had retreated into their tent (which was made for two people this time – they had swapped with Jinpachi and Makishima) soon after their dinner trip, planning to get more sleep than the previous night.

"So what have you suggested?"

Yasutomo was in the middle of changing his shirt and Shinkai's question caused him to freeze with his head inside the piece of clothing. Even time seemed to stop, he was so still.

_Was it that huge of an issue?_

Then Yasutomo continued getting dressed, meaning that he tried to violently yank his shirt on. Shinkai watched for a moment as his tent mate wrestled with the cloth before clearing his throat. "That's a sleeve."

Yasutomo swore and tugged his shirt off to look at it properly before pulling it on in the right way. His black hair was tousled from the operation and his black eyes were staring at the tent wall.

"You seriously don't remember?"

"Nope."

Yasutomo turned to look at him. "Do you remember what you said about Gackt?"

Heh. "Yeah, I do. But that wasn't a promise." _Or was it?_

Had he promised to try to get in Gackt's bed?

No, he could never be drunk enough to promise that.

"Yeah well…" Yasutomo arranged – wrenched – the hem of his shirt over his pyjama pants. Usually he wore nothing more than underpants in bed. Shinkai knew it from the numerous training and race trips. He himself didn't usually wear more than underpants in bed. But in France it became surprisingly cold during nights and the sleeping bag wasn't enough to keep him warm. Yasutomo tugged the zipper of his sleeping bag, opening it and lying down. His movements were still a little too fast, nervous-like. Was he upset because Shinkai didn't remember?

Shinkai waited, but his tent buddy didn't say anything, he was just lying on his back, snuffling to himself. Alright, he'd talk when he was ready. Shinkai pulled out a pocket size detective novel that he'd bought just for the trip, intending to read it until he fell asleep. Which wouldn't take long.

"We talked about who you'd do it with if you had to screw a guy."

Yes, he remembered this subject. It had presented itself a few times during their trip ('a few' had to be pronounced very emphatically and with sarcasm). Apparently Yasutomo was having some kind of identity crisis since he was constantly musing over it.

Shinkai lowered his book. What kind of friend would he be if he didn't listen to a guy in need? "Yep, that we did."

"And if we forget those Gackts and other celebrities because it would be kinda unlikely that you'd get a chance to try it out with him, even if he had a fetish for high school boys… The real option however would be to experiment with someone close to you – so you wouldn't need to go and hang around some gay bars – and…" Yasutomo trailed off, taking a deep breath. He was searching for a more careless tone. Shinkai could have pointed out that that ship had sailed long ago.

"And I asked who'd you be with if you had to choose one of us."

Had he really asked something like that? Shinkai couldn't reach the memory but he had a feeling that something of the sort they had jabbered about. This was what had been nagging him earlier when his eyes had brushed over Yasutomo.

He hmm'd to indicate that his friend could continue.

"So and then…" Yasutomo cut his explanation off once more, rolling onto his side to support himself on his elbow, facing Shinkai. "You really, honest to God, don't remember?"

"I don't! I wouldn't lie about something like this. I was so fucking wasted or more likely half asleep when you started talking about it. I just remember that you tried to mol–"

_Molest me?_

Shinkai stared at Yasutomo. Yasutomo stared at him. Seconds passed, becoming a minute, then another and then yet another. Then the time stopped altogether. The wind was rustling the tent fabric. Somewhere in the outside world a baby was crying.

Hmm, there were grey-brown specks in Yasutomo's seemingly black eyes once you got a closer look. Shinkai hadn't noticed before._  
_

"You want to fuck _me_?" he finally said, stated like in the morning when you look out the window and state that it had been raining during the night. Because that was all he was capable of.

Yasutomo threw his head aside, breaking their eye contact. The muscles in his jaw were tensing up, Shinkai could see them outlined on his skin. "Not exactly… I mean, I don't specifically want to fuck _you_. I was just thinking when we talked about how it would be interesting to try and... maybe it would be most convenient with a teammate."

Shinkai failed to see any logic in that.

"If you really want to screw a teammate, how about Juichi?"

Yasutomo looked at him all too meaningfully. "Do you have any idea what you just said?"

Yeah, suppose it wasn't up for discussion, not even on a theoretical level.

"If I remember correctly, Jinpachi was excluded, but maybe Touichirou would be up for it?" he suggested.

"No, not gonna happen."

"Manami?"

"Christ, Shinkai! Can you hear yourself talking? Can you hear the absurdities flying out of your mouth?"

_Can you?_

Not that Shinkai could (nor wanted to) imagine Yasutomo going at it with a freshman. Manami's sexuality was a mystery in any case. Shinkai didn't spend his time thinking about his teammate's orientations but Manami was one of those cases where it wouldn't be surprising even if his libido was directed towards tree trunks.

"In other words, you wanna fuck me," he repeated.

"Argh, I said it's not specifically…"

"But if you don't accept anyon–"

"I would, if there were other people in our team besides the least loony elite of an outpatient care – that wasn't a compliment – and one iron-masked piece of wood!"

"And I'm not part of that outpatient care lot?"

Yasutomo lowered his gaze, and Shinkai thought he saw a hint of pink on his cheeks. Arakita Yasutomo embarrassed? They must be nearing the greatest plot twist of all times. "Um, you're not so… You have some sense in your head and…" he muttered.

Shinkai wiped his face, taking a deep inhale. This was by far one of the strangest situations he'd come across during his relatively short life. "You know what, Yasutomo? Can I just say that I'm flattered? For the fact that you could consider... um, fucking me." _I salute thee, sentence I never thought I would say._ "But I've got a girlfriend and actually I consider myself quite straight and…"

"I'm not asking you to marry me, damn it!" Yasutomo barked, remembering only afterwards where they were and lowering his volume considerably. "You're making the whole thing bigger than it is. I only said it would be interesting to try it… to find out what it would be like with a guy. And it would be safest to try it with someone you already know." He trailed off, his jaw moving, as he searched for words. "I don't see it as cheating. If I had a girlfriend, I wouldn't think that. It's more like… solidarity between guys. It wouldn't involve feelings. It's a bit like when you jerk off with other guys in a locker room."

In Shinkai's opinion, it wasn't the same at all.

On the other hand, Yasutomo was right about the detail that excluding feelings changed the act. There wouldn't be anything romantic involved. It would be purely mechanical performance, without any unnecessary touching, kissing or anything that would indicate passion or two people caring about each other.

Shinkai didn't think of himself as flawless person. However, he did think of himself as a peace-loving, generally nice guy. Sometimes being a nice guy became a burden. He could step into other person's shoes, see things from their point of view too easily. He gave in too easily when persuaded. The quality had gotten him in trouble before.

But this was… this was in a league of its own.

"I think I can see your point," he began, probing, because he was afraid of giving Yasutomo the wrong impression. "About it not being cheating mentally, if there are no feelings involved. But there's, like, this minor rule about being a boyfriend and a girlfriend and that's no touching other people below the waistline. Unless you happen to be a doctor, which I'm not."

Yasutomo stayed quiet for a moment, digesting his words. Probably coming up with a counterargument.

"You genuinely like that chick?"

"Hmh?" The question caught Shinkai off guard. "Ayane?"

"Yeah."

"Sure, yeah. I like her. I mean, we haven't been dating for that long but..."

"So you're not with her just to get laid regularly?"

"No, I'm not."

Yasutomo huffed, looking like he'd still want to say something but then he decided otherwise. Good. Shinkai tolerated many things but criticizing his girlfriend wasn't one of them.

Yasutomo rolled onto his back, sighing again. The tent quietened down. Shinkai lay staring at the ceiling for a moment but then picked up his book again.

He couldn't really decide how to feel about his teammate at the moment. It wasn't that Yasutomo had confessed to have a crush on him or something equally weird, he was only curious (anyone would be if they watched that much porn) and Shinkai was conveniently available. But he was totally the wrong person. He had a girlfriend and had, while musing over the subject of having sex with a man, come to the conclusion that it really wasn't his thing. Girls were soft and cute and tender and clean and everything boys weren't. Those were the qualities that he valued in girls; that made him attracted to them. Instead, if he'd have to stick his face close to other guy's equipment… hrrgh!

Although. He had heard... or he was under the impression that the sex act itself with another guy wasn't all that bad. Like, if you forgot that men were hairy, noisy and dirty. He had also heard that anal sex was quite a memorable experience for a receiving party too, and specifically in a positive manner when done right. If he didn't have to fondle the guy or kiss him or touch his dick, he maybe could have…

Dear lord, was he actually thinking about it now?

"So you'd be putting me in the chick's role?" he checked.

Yasutomo practically jumped at his question. He had probably already thought that they wouldn't discuss the matter anymore that night.

"Er… you mean like…"

_Because you asked me that one night if I have ever considered letting someone fuck me. That's how you phrased it. That I would be the one to take it up the ass._

"Because if we now, in theory, pictured that I could see myself agreeing to something like that – just out of curiosity. Hypothetically," he emphasized. "The partner should be of a very active kind because I'm really not sure if I'd be willing to touch another guy's dick."

He knew that he was an exception. In some cultures to be gay was only to be on the receiving end, the bottom, and the active party was still considered straight. According to that, he should have wanted to be the one topping. But… if he'd ever get involved in that sort of craziness, he felt like it would be easier to just lie down and let the other guy do the job rather than try to make himself get excited over flat chests, narrow hips or hairy asses. Not that Yasutomo had a particularly hairy ass but naturally he had more wool than girls.

_Oi oi, you shouldn't be thinking that! You've got a girlfriend! You're straight!_

Fucking hell, what was the matter with him?

Yasutomo's jaw was hanging open and his eyes had moved to the far right, as he stared at Shinkai. He felt a small jolt of twisted pleasure for being able catch Yasutomo off guard for a change. And it gave him back some of his composure, bringing a grain of humour to the whole ordeal. Because, cross his heart, he really couldn't take this conversation seriously anymore.

Yasutomo pulled himself together. "Sure, you could be the bitch. If you wanted to."

"Okay." Shinkai nodded to himself, getting back to his book. "Just checking."

"What are y–?"

"Shh, Yasutomo, I'm reading my book now."

A snort. And then another. Finally, as Shinkai refused to react, Yasutomo pulled the zipper up to his chin, rolling onto his side with his back towards Shinkai. His side rose high and then collapsed, as he let the air out his lungs. Shinkai was chuckling inwardly.

"I still think," he said. "That you should get yourself a girlfriend too."

* * *

A/N: The remark about Andy and Frank (or it's Fränk actually) was inspired by this post: post/91797987836/ok-but-can-you-imagine-if-izumida-ever-goes-pro

Fan art! Emsandman drew a very drunken Shinkai wearing Mr. Pierre's hat and also Toudou lecturing Arakita about smoking. You can check it out here: post/94148544595/hungover-and-ashamed-shinkai-is-forced-to-borrow

She also drew the picture that Manami took from the previous chapter: post/93193424420/manamis-photo-of-a-very-hungover-arakita-and


	11. Chapter 11

A/N: I had this chapter ready, just forgot to post the previous one. So here you go!

Warning! Some mild mature stuff ahead.

* * *

**Chapter 11 – Eating competitions and useless tents **

~o~

It was hot. It was absolutely too hot.

And it wasn't hot as in a warm July morning in a sleeping bag but hot as in the acceleration of blood circulation that was caused by hormones that made your skin burn and get oversensitive. It also made certain body parts ache. Hotness that came from within.

The moment that the sweating started to billow overboard, Shinkai was startled awake.

The tent was dim and the environment quiet apart from occasional chirps from birds and crickets. Shinkai grabbed his phone from where it was lying beside his head, checking the time. Four. The morning wasn't even close.

He ripped his sleeping bag's zipper open, freeing his upper body. Cool air breezed across his shirt-covered chest, drying the sweat. It wasn't that hot in the tent after all. Without his sleeping bag he would have been shivering through the nights, but it still felt like his legs were on fire. He unwrapped himself from the sweaty sausage skin, lying down on top of it with his limbs spread out as wide as he could in the crowded space. His fingers brushed against Yasutomo's lower back. He was still sleeping with his face towards the wall after their nightly conversation. And that was good, since Shinkai really wasn't sure if he'd been able to look at his friend's face because…

Okay. Alright.

So he had had a dream. An erotic dream. The type that was very typical for a guy of his age. He had them a couple of times a week, though he usually couldn't remember details. They only left a throbbing pressure in his lower body – in those cases when they didn't proceed until the end, which happened quite rarely nowadays. Because he had a girlfriend, and even besides that he had learned to take care of himself and not let the pressure build up.

He had had an erotic dream. But instead of having it of his girlfriend or even some faceless woman…

..he had had it of his friend.

God damn Yasutomo. God damn him and his 'Hey Shinkai, by the way, I wanna screw you in the ass' revelations just before bedtime.

God damn Yasutomo, because he had made Shinkai actually think about it.

He couldn't remember details of his dream but he remembered Yasutomo's presence. His unique scent (lawn after rain – was it even possible to smell anything in your sleep?) and his slightly calloused fingers somewhere on his body. He remembered a strong sexual pressure – and even if he hadn't, he'd have felt the results in his lower body.

Shinkai lifted his hands to his face, wiping it. He let the air escape from his lungs before inhaling deeply again, held his breath and then relaxed, trying to wake up properly to clear his thoughts, because the world has a tendency to seem twisted and the problems seem to increase when it is four at the morning.

Phew. Oh boy.

Shinkai was one of those people who was said to be comfortable in their own skin. He had no self-esteem problems with his appearance (though his lips could have been a bit thinner and less ladylike) and he was okay with his personality. Yes, he too had his demons (no pun intended) and he didn't always like himself but it wasn't very often that he got confused with the little quirks of his mind or body. He knew that it was perfectly normal to have erotic dreams of your friends. Somebody, he couldn't remember who but it definitely wasn't Juichi, had said that he'd gone through all of his friend in his sleep. The human mind wasn't always logical, and especially not the subconscious.

But this… like he had already said, this was in a league of its own.

If he had had a random dream of Yasutomo without the recent discussions, he'd have just shrugged and laughed it off. Maybe mentioned it to the person himself so that they could have laughed at it together and Yasutomo could have called him a closet fag.

Ugh, better to not try to analyze it too much and just let the whole thing fade away on its own. He'd go to sleep again, and in the morning the world would be rotating in the right direction again.

He just had a minor problem. His erection, left by the dream, was of the calibre that getting rid of it would require either a shock (an ice-cold shower, getting caught by a friend or having a bear show up at the tent's door) or five hours worth of an extremely boring activity (like mathematics or politicians' jargon). Given that he didn't want to take care of it. Which actually sounded like the most appealing option. A stubborn pulse was throbbing in his groin and in his dick so hard that it would only take for him to lightly graze over it. If he just went back to sleep, he might wet his pants and he was already short on clothes.

There was just a minor detail. Yasutomo was sleeping next to him.

Jerking off next to your sleeping mates wasn't that uncommon. Shinkai was pretty sure that almost every one of them, maybe excluding Juichi, had done it sometimes during a training or race trip, but then they hadn't slept this tightly. Then they hadn't dreamt about their friends lying next to them. Or who knew if Yasutomo had. Dreamt about Shinkai.

The thought made shivers run through his body. He couldn't even identify them correctly – were they out of disgust? – but they made his erection twitch against the fabric of his pants.

How far was that bathroom again?

He hauled himself up, planning to head straight to the bathroom to take care of his problem but the new position made his pants rub against the sensitive head of his dick and a new wave of pleasure washed over him, his breath getting stuck in his throat.

Okay then. Let's forget those washing facilities. Tissue. Where had he hidden his tissues?

He found a couple of wrinkled tissues in the side pocket of his bag and after grabbing them, he lay down once more. His breathing was becoming laborious, and he tried to calm it down while listening for any sounds from Yasutomo. He was breathing in a way that people breathe when they are sound asleep, not silently but letting out little snores. Yasutomo would never fake snoring. The coast was clear as long as Shinkai kept quiet.

He dug himself back in the half-open sleeping bag, pushed his pants down in order to not wet them and grabbed himself. The touch of fingers sent a new tremor through him, and he felt blood packing in his aching shaft with a whole new power. A few strokes would do the trick.

It took him about ten seconds to arch his back and wet the tissue. He clenched his teeth to keep himself from making any sounds as the orgasm washed over him, making his groin convulse and his toes curl. It was quick and sharp, a moment's pleasure and then relaxation, the only purpose being just to relieve pressure. He kept quiet, but if Yasutomo had been awake, he would have figured from the rhythm of his breathing what he was up to.

He was left to lie on his back, boneless, waiting for his breath to even before he wrapped the wet tissue inside of another, crunched it into a ball and placed it next to his sleeping back (on the wall's side).

"Yasutomo, you asshole. I hope you're happy now," he whispered to the tent ceiling before tucking himself inside his sleeping bag again and closing his eyes.

* * *

"Shinkai, Shinkai, Shinkai!"

"Go, Tadokoro!"

"Tadokorocchi!"

"You can do it, grandpa! Show them what you're made of!"

"Just a little more, Shinkai! Show them that Hakogaku are champions in other things besides cycling!"

"We have faith in you, Tadokoro-san!"

"Eat faster, ass-face! Let them see there's more to you than bunny farming!"

Jinpachi's face was emitting shock as he glanced at Yasutomo and returned to Shinkai. "Hayato, you want me to slap Arakita for you?"

Yasutomo threw a contemptuous look at Jinpachi. "Like you could do it, featherweight."

"Shut up, I've got more muscle than you."

"It's all fat."

"It's definitely not fat!" Jinpachi was practically screaming. "You're the one who gets wiped out to the sky like a dry blade of grass immediately when the wind speed exceeds 5 meters per second!"

Arakita leaned over the table. Poorly disguised rage was dancing in his eyes as he drilled his gaze into Jinpachi. "You wanna arm wrestle?"

"No. I want to see how this turns out."

"But after that."

For a moment, Jinpachi looked like he was looking for a way out of the challenge, but he apparently had something to prove. "Deal."

"Shit, this is getting better yet!" Naruko exclaimed. "Hey, old man, beat that upstart quickly so we'll get to see the next match!"

"Hmm-mh!" Tadokoro was chuffing with his mouth full. He chewed and swallowed laboriously. "Someone go and tell the staff to bring more food to the buffet!"

"Mr. Pierre is already on it."

"Excellent." A choked burp. "How're you doing, skinny pants? Feel like giving up already?"

Shinkai flashed him a wide smile even though he knew that his teeth were covered in food mash. "Definitely not. What is it, toothpick, you getting worried there?"

For a passing second, it looked like Tadokoro was about to frown, but he fixed his appearance quickly. "For you, yes."

"No need to worry about me," Shinkai said. If he was speaking truthfully, he actually hoped that Sohoku's giant sprinter would get a full stomach soon. Because he was starting to be. _Utterly. Completely. __Stuffed._ He had already had to open the button of his shorts to get more room for his bloating and soon he'd have to do the same thing to the zipper too.

They had seen the start of the Tour's 13th stage, and after that it had again been time to change their location, but by the decision of majority they had stayed in the city of Tours to have lunch before driving to the next place called Lyon, where they'd get to watch the 14th stage's home stretch. First they had been planning to look for a French bistro to have a taste of local cuisine, but then they had walked past an Indian restaurant that was serving a lunch buffet. Seven euros to eat all you want. And at that point things had gotten out of hand.

Nobody had suggested an eating competition; somehow they had just drifted into it. Naruko, who ate like a starving elephant himself, had pointed out – noticed – that Shinkai was gorging almost as much food as Tadokoro.

_Almost._ That had been the key word.

Shinkai had a competitive drive, but technically it only went off when cycling. Usually he just did what he wanted and let the other people fuss. It consumed energy needlessly and elevated the stress levels to compete over unnecessary things. But when Jinpachi and Yasutomo and _Izumida_ had started to argue with the Sohoku guys about which team's senior sprinter ate more, a tiny spark had lit up in Shinkai's gut.

And why not? The buffet was full of chicken tikka masala, lamb korma, shrimp vindaloo, paneer cheese in tomato curry sauce and naan bread. Shinkai had eaten Indian food maybe only once before. He hadn't remembered it was this tasty. At the point when they had started to compete with Tadokoro, he'd decided to stick with the milder curries. The spiciest dish of the buffet had already made him sweat so that his fringe had turned into curls. He strategically chose chicken and vegetable curries because they weren't as heavy as lamb.

But now, after the fourth dish, he was beginning to understand what it meant to be literally 'fed up with something'.

"In middle school Shinkai was the one to arrange eating performances during breaks. Other students even brought him food for it. One time he tried to eat eighty takoyaki balls. He got up until seventy-one when the bell rang," Manami told them.

For a passing second, embarrassment tried to mess up Shinkai's rhythm. "Juichi, didn't you promise that you weren't going to tell that to anyone!"

Juichi kept his posture. "I can't recall there was any discussion on the matter."

"That's nothing, really," Teshima said. "One time we went to a restaurant with Tadokoro after a race and the next day the restaurant had to keep their doors closed because they ran out of everything." Aoyagi nodded enthusiastically to his teammate's words.

"Near our school there's a buffet restaurant that doesn't even let Shinkai in anymore," Manami said.

"But one morning at a training camp Tadokoro emptied the fridge before we were even awake and that camp was kilometres away from the nearest shop…"

The original purpose of the competition was turning from eating to embarrassing the competitors. Instead of _oohing_ in amazement, the supporters of the opposite side burst into laughter. Shinkai tried to ignore his environment and concentrate only on how he could swallow the contents of his plate. He took a short break, hoping that his stomach would work faster.

A chef came to pour more chicken and lamb into the buffet and Tadokoro jumped onto his feet, marching to fetch his fifth serving. Damn it. Shinkai let out a bubbling burp that felt more like a small puke and lifted his fork again. He was good at approximately two things in his life. The other one was cycling, the other was eating. How could he look at himself in the mirror if he lost one of his merits?

But after downing the last of his curry he realized that he simply couldn't eat any more. The mere thought made him nauseous and he was afraid to stand up as he'd probably tear at the seams. And that blasted Tadokoro was already munching his latest fill of plate.

The fork dropped from his hand with a clang. "I can't. I can't anymore."

"What the fuck!" Yasutomo yelled. "Fucking eat!"

"Can't. Gonna puke soon." He leaned back on his seat, holding his stomach. "I give up. You win, Tadokoro."

Tadokoro let out a roar that sounded more like a bear preparing to fight than human and slammed his hands on the table. The other customers and the staff probably jumped half a meter into the air out of fright.

Yasutomo didn't take losing too well. "Congratulations. You just became completely useless."

"It would be interesting to see you eat that amount of food," Jinpachi remarked. "Hayato, are you okay? You look a little sick."

Shinkai wiped his forehead. He was still sweating and his cheeks were burning. Maybe he should have stopped with the previous serving. "Ungh, sure. I'll be fine. I just need to... sit for a while before we get going."

Tadokoro ate one more forkful as if to affirm his victory, but then pushed away his plate and grunted painfully. He had kept his posture neutral throughout the competition, Shinkai had to give him that.

"What will your digestion say about that?" Yasutomo asked him. "I have to sleep in the same tent as you."

"There isn't a food that my digestion couldn't handle." Though at the moment there was a bitter taste of lamb korma lurking in his throat, making him swallow repeatedly. His stomach was full up to his esophagus. "Besides, you don't 'have to' sleep in the same tent with me. Until now you've wanted to yourself. We can switch if you're afraid of my digestion. You go with Juichi and Manami, and I can share my tent with Izumida."

"Nope. Not gonna happen."

Shinkai waited for an explanation. It never came.

Instead, he started to feel his stomach convulse. And then cramp. And then cramp a bit more. Maybe he shouldn't have spoken so quickly. Indian food used spices that his stomach wasn't used to.

"I could pop in the bathroom for a minute, though."

"After that gorging I bet you're going to push out a five-kilo dump!" Naruko exclaimed. "I always have to sit for at least half an hour on the toilet after a spicy meal. There's probably going to be some serious tumbling in your gut soon!"

Onoda tried to hush his friend. "Naruko-kun, I'm not sure if the others want to hear…"

"Pfft, we all have to shit, don't we?"

"If someone needs to go, I recommend that you get in line soon. There's only one booth for each sex," said Izumida who had gone to the restaurant's bathroom before they started eating.

"I'm going to go first then." Shinkai climbed to his feet. All the blood suddenly left his head, making him almost reel. He had to support himself on the back of the chairs. Luckily his balance returned soon. He really didn't want to ask for an escort for a bathroom visit.

"Leave some toilet paper for the others too!" Naruko hollered after him. Thank god, the other customers didn't understand Japanese.

When Shinkai returned, Jinpachi and Yasutomo were already beginning their arm-wrestling. Okay… he had thought that they had only been blustering.

"I think the staff might have something to say about that," Izumida mused as Jinpachi grabbed Yasutomo's offered hand.

"They're not gonna say anything if they can't see," Naruko said. "Hey, grandpa, move to the front!"

Tadokoro moved to cover the visibility of the counter and didn't even react to the name that Naruko used.

Manami claimed the role of the setter for himself. "Ready… set… GO!"

First it looked like Jinpachi was going to slam Yasutomo's hand on the table right away but Yasutomo pulled himself together quickly, straightening their forearms. If Shinkai had bet on the winner, he would have invested his money in Yasutomo. Jinpachi wasn't weak by any means, but Yasutomo was driven by the rage of a wild animal. There was the same fire burning in his eyes as during races. And Shinkai already knew what he was thinking: _Hell, if he lost to Jinpachi, who he had called a bitch, he would never be able to look at his teammates in the eyes again._

Contrary to Shinkai and Tadokoro, nobody dared (or had the energy) to cheer at the wrestling duo. Everyone was just staring, afraid to even touch the table. After half a minute their arms were shaking and Yasutomo dominated the match for a while. But then Jinpachi corrected his posture and their arms returned to the neutral zone.

And that continued for so long that the audience started to get bored. It seemed that Jinpachi and Yasutomo were equally strong. When the staff started to throw glances at their direction, Juichi decided to break it off.

"Okay, that's enough. Stop! It's a draw!"

"Wha– no, it's not!" Yasutomo burst out, and at the same time his concentration wavered so that Jinpachi was able to slam his hand down on the table.

"Hah, I won! What did you say about fat again, stick man?"

"It doesn't count. Fuku-chan called it off!"

"Of course it counts!"

"No, it doesn't! I stopped pushing against you!"

"Yeah, yeah. You just don't want to admit that you have two threads in your arms instead of biceps."

Shinkai and Izumida had to grab Yasutomo under his arms, as he was storming across the table to strangle Jinpachi.

"Toudou," Makishima said. "Fukutomi did cut off the match before you managed to slam Arakita's hand on the table."

"But if we had continued for even one more second, I'd have won!"

"Maybe, maybe not. Yasutomo got distracted when Juichi told you to stop," Shinkai said.

"Shut up, don't you try to defend me!" Yasutomo snarled. "And you, you god damn bag of peas, we're gonna have a rematch tonight!"

Jinpachi crossed his arms, leaning back in his seat with an extremely self-satisfied smile on his lips. "Fine by me."

"And then nobody is gonna cut us off. The match ends only when your hand hits the table."

"Don't you mean yours?"

"Okay, that's enough," Juichi told them. "We need to collect our stuff and change the location. We have a couple of hours drive ahead of us."

* * *

They had to stop twice during their drive due to the side effects caused by Indian food. Shinkai didn't have to go anymore – he'd been right about his digestion – but practically everyone else had to. Their next location was a camping area near Lyon, in a small medieval village with a name that sounded like something a pig would say (Shinkai couldn't remember it more precisely). They set up their tent with a routine, and they even had several hours to go and take a look around. Jinpachi got it into his head that he wanted to see a local clay pot museum and dragged Makishima along with him. They didn't return before ten o'clock. Yasutomo said to Shinkai that he really didn't want to know what the duo had been doing, to which Shinkai answered that at least neither one of them was drunk. But he too suspected that they had done something else during their trip other than just ogling at ancient clay pots.

Around half past ten, everyone was ready to call it a night and get into their tents. And that was good, because at the same moment a heavy downpour hit the campsite.

Shinkai was amongst the last ones to return from the bathrooms, and he had to run to the camp to avoid getting another shower.

Yasutomo was already lounging on his sleeping back, playing with his cell, as Shinkai pulled the tent door open and dived inside.

"Don't touch the ceiling, water will soak through," he said over his phone.

"It shouldn't do that so easily."

"I'm not so sure. This is the tent that Fuku-chan got from the birdwatching club."

Shinkai who was just arranging his toiletries back into his bag stopped. "The one that can't hold water?"

"Yeah, that one."

"What the fuck? Why have we brought such a crappy tent with us?"

"You can go and ask Fuku-chan that."

"We can't sleep here if the rain continues." As to confirm his words, a wet spot started forming in the ceiling. "It will become a pond!"

"Mm-m."

Yasutomo took the whole thing very lightly, considering that he had a tendency to catch all the spring and autumn colds. He'd been strangely quiet the whole afternoon and evening, hadn't even reminded Jinpachi about the arm-wrestling match (though Jinpachi hadn't reminded him either, but he had won after all). Shinkai didn't know what kind of mood swing his tent mate was having and at the moment he didn't care either. Priorities first. Sleeping in a wet tent would give them the cold of the century. Humid air and wet hair were already making him shiver.

"This isn't working. We have to change our accommodation."

"How? Are you gonna go and cuddle with Izumida in his sleeping bag?" There was more sarcasm in Yasutomo's voice than Shinkai thought necessary.

"If I must. You can stay here if you like, but I don't wish to sleep in a puddle. Besides, our stuff will get wet too."

Yasutomo huffed and pulled himself upright, tucking his phone into his pocket. "Okay then, do you think we could make a bed in the back of the van?"

"Kinjou said the seats are detachable, so it should be possible." Hopefully the mechanism was simple.

Shinkai pulled on his coat that held water the best and covered his head with its hood. For a moment, it looked like Yasutomo was not going to lift a finger to rearrange their sleeping quarters, but then he let out another huff and grabbed his coat too.

"The car is locked and Mr. Pierre has the key," Shinkai said as they stepped outside in the pouring rain. Christ, the water was falling down with such a force that it would test the other tents too. "Which one is theirs?"

"It's the big blue one." Yasutomo pointed at the tent set up right beside the car. Since his coat didn't have a hood, he had to pull the neck part over his head to prevent his hair from getting soaked but that resulted in his lower back getting a good whipping from the rain.

Shinkai lifted his hand to knock, remembering then that knocking didn't really work with tents and instead calling out. "Kinjou-san? Excuse me! Could you open up, please?"

A rustle came from inside and then the zipper was pulled up. Kinjou's eternally serious face peeked out from the opening.

"I'm sorry to disturb you, but our tent can't hold water," Shinkai explained. "Could we maybe get the key to the car? We'd spend the night in it."

"Yes, of course." Kinjou vanished back inside. Shinkai heard him asking for the key from Mr. Pierre. He pulled his hood over his head better. He hadn't been outside for half a minute and he was already like a drowned rat. Then Kinjou reappeared, handing him the key. "Do you know how to detach the seats?"

"I don't know the system really."

"There are grooves in the floor in which the seats are pushed in and locked into place," came Mr. Pierre's voice from inside. "It should be pretty easy, but come and tell me if you don't know how to do it."

"Alright, thanks."

Kinjou looked at him for a moment, his face thoughtful, before turning back inside the tent. "Tadokoro, go and help them out."

Surprisingly, Sohoku's giant sprinter didn't protest his fate. He crawled out with a grunt but only cursed the weather. He was only wearing a tee shirt and boxers with bears printed on them (how appropriate), and the sky flood hit his light clothing with remarkable force.

"You go and fetch your stuff. I'll go and remove the seats."

Shinkai dropped the key into his open palm. "But wouldn't it be quicker if we helped you?"

"It's not gonna take long." Tadokoro smirked at him before opening the middle door and slipping inside.

Shinkai didn't waste time arguing. He wanted to get into his warm sleeping bag soon. Yasutomo was already collecting their stuff and Shinkai waited outside, grabbing the items that were handed over to him. They had to empty the whole tent.

Tadokoro was efficient. As Shinkai went to throw the first bag in the car, he had already removed two seats.

"It's gonna be pretty cramped. I had to pile the removed seats behind the front seat row because there isn't any other place for them. Why the hell did you take such a lousy tent with you?"

Shinkai sighed. "I'd tell you if I knew."

Yasutomo followed with the rest of their stuff, dropping them onto the front traveller's seat. Shinkai still felt like they should help Tadokoro but the guy seemed to have a good momentum going so he didn't want to interfere. Shame though, that he hadn't clocked it. Roughly estimated, it had taken Tadokoro only five minutes to remove all the necessary seats.

"It fast when you know what you're doing," he said as Tadokoro straightened himself as far as he could in the car, wiping his hands. "Thank you, Tadokoro-san."

"You're welcome. The floor's pretty hard but maybe it'll do for one night."

"Better that than a puddle."

Tadokoro left, leaving them to arrange their stuff on the car's not-so-clean floor. They had the pads to keep the sleeping bags from getting dirty, but they weren't much of a mattress.

"Fucking hell, how uncomfortable," Yasutomo complained as they had lain down. Because of the removed seats they weren't able to lie properly in line with the van's walls so they had settled with their heads in the one corner of the space and their feet in the opposite corner. One person would have been able to lie there without touching anything, but because there were two of them, their feet brushed against the car walls. Their soaked clothes had been hung over the seats and the windows were already starting to fog up from humidity. But it was still drier than outside or in the tent. Drier and warmer.

"Would have you preferred to wallow in a pond?" Shinkai asked. "Or I suppose that Izumida's sleeping bag is still available."

"Shut your mouth," Yasutomo grumbled, rolling onto his side to face Shinkai. His eyes were squeezed shut and the lower part of his face was buried in the sleeping bag. "Hey, Shinkai."

Shinkai had just gotten out his detective novel and was very much planning to read it for a bit – for what he could see in the dimly lit car, which wasn't much – but Yasutomo's tone told him that he was about say something that would steal Shinkai's attention completely. Something that would involve him. Something that would most probably be connected their earlier questionable conversations.

He stifled a sigh. "Yeah?"

"What do you say if we open our sleeping bags and use them as blankets?"

"Why'd you want to do that?"

"Because it's so suffocating to sleep in this sausage skin. We'd get more room for our limbs."

"You can do that if you want, but there will be even less padding under your back."

"No, I meant that we'd open both of them, put the other one under our backs and use the other one as a blanket."

"So we'd share a blanket?"

He got a reticent affirmation. Yasutomo still had his eyes closed and was clearly trying to look like it didn't matter that much. And Shinkai wouldn't have thought anything of the suggestion, had there not been certain conversation lurking in the recent history. The sleeping bags weren't that wide; they would have to sleep really close to each other.

"We can use mine as a mattress if you're afraid of yours getting dirty."

Shinkai was about to decline, but some twisted curiosity in the back corner of his mind stopped him. Maybe he wanted to see what Yasutomo would do. How far would he dare to take his experiments without Shinkai's approval?

_I wonder what Ayane would say if she heard about me sharing a blanket with that 'maniac'?_

He waited for a pinch of guilt from his conscience, and it came after a little while. But it was subdued and easily pushed aside. Curiosity brushed it away without effort.

With Yasutomo, it was wrong to talk about curiosity anymore. It sounded more like an obsession.

"Okay then," he said. He had waited for a reaction and didn't have to be disappointed. Yasutomo's eyes flew open and he yanked his chin out of the sleeping bag. Shinkai sat up and started to unzip his sleeping bag. "I'll open this up. You take care of yours."

Yasutomo crawled out to sit up too, and a very weird, but in its own way also very _endearing,_ confusion was painted all over his face. One of those expressions many people didn't even know that he was capable of.

"What are you ogling at there?" Shinkai asked. "Get to work so we'll have a chance to catch some sleep tonight."

Yasutomo mumbled something that sounded like swear words, but he began opening his own sleeping bag. He avoided looking at Shinkai, pretending to concentrate on the task at hand, but Shinkai could see a small smile on his lips.

There was a faint fluttering in his stomach that absolutely shouldn't have been there. Not in this situation.

He might regret his curiosity in the end.

* * *

A/N: Pointless eating competition is pointless. For some reason they spend a lot of time in the tents / sleeping bags in this fic. : D And yay, I managed to squeeze in some poop talks à Naruko!


	12. Chapter 12

A/N: Thanks for everyone who left a comment again! About the translation, I have a very good beta. I think the text would be more awkward without her. :)

* * *

**Chapter 12 – Amazing clay pots, so ahead of their time**

~o~

"Ice cream."

"What?"

"Ice cream," Toudou repeated. "Let's go and test what French ice cream is like!"

"What happened to your health hype?" Maki-chan asked. A small smile was tugging at the corners of his mouth.

"Nah, it's okay to eat ice cream once in the summer." The day had been hot and after the spicy Indian meal Toudou was craving something refreshing. Their current camping location didn't even have any swimming opportunities. "Besides, you can think of it as cultural exploration."

"Maybe so."

Toudou jumped to his feet, swatting dry grass off of his backside. They had set up their tent, it was only six pm and they had nothing planned for that evening. The others had also talked about a small sightseeing tour, and Toudou wanted to get going before the whole other gang would try to join them. "Shall we go then?"

Maki-chan huffed before also climbing to his feet and packing a water bottle into his colourful shoulder bag that he always brought with him to city tours.

"But we should keep quiet so that the kids don't get it in their heads to follow us," Toudou warned. Someone might have said that he was already spending enough time alone with Maki-chan because they shared a tent but it wasn't the same as going for a sightseeing tour together. The more people, the more interruptions, and Toudou wasn't up for negotiating his plans.

Maki-chan didn't protest. Toudou had already guessed that he wouldn't, since he wasn't the most social butterfly in town.

One would have thought that it would be hard to avoid others in such a small camp, but everyone seemed to have something to do. Kinjou and Tadokoro, along with the second-years, had gone to walk around the camping area, Izumida had immersed himself in telling Mr. Pierre, who was snoozing in his camp chair, about his gardening hobby (for once the poor guy had an audience that didn't immediately silence him) and Sohoku's first-years were playing something with cards that seemed to amuse Naruko and irritate Imaizumi. Manami had once again disappeared, probably fallen asleep on a toilet or something equally charming. They walked past Shinkai who was lounging on the grass and asked where they were going. He looked like he only asked out of curiosity, not because he actually wanted to join them, but you could never be sure.

"A clay pot museum. I heard they had one in this town," Toudou told him. He sensed surprise from Maki-chan but luckily his green-haired friend kept his mouth shut.

"Oh, okay. Well, have fun then."

They weren't able to leave yet because at that moment Arakita returned from the washing facilities and wanted to know the same thing as Shinkai. "Where are you two lovebirds heading?"

His words made an intense wave of heat spread over Toudou's cheeks. Why the hell was Arakita asking that with such a questionable choice of words? He most definitely wasn't interested in tagging along, Toudou knew that without asking. He probably just wanted them to bring him something unhealthy, such as Bepsi or cigarettes. Which Toudou wasn't going to do.

He straightened his posture, lifting his chin defiantly. He had beaten Arakita in an arm-wrestling match, after all. "We're going to a clay pot museum."

Arakita raised his brows, letting out a stunned snort. "Oh my fucking god."

"Well, sorry. Some of us happen to be interested in culture. It shouldn't bother you even if we educate ourselves in the old local livelihood. Tourist travel here from afar only to see those pots. Some of them are so fantastic it's been said that they were centuries ahead of their time." Damn, if he continued his lie, he'd soon start to believe it himself.

Arakita waved them off. "By all means, go."

"Let's go then, Maki-chan," Toudou said, swinging his bag over his shoulder better. "Don't expect us to return too early."

"Just remember to take a lot of photos of those god damn amazing clay pots," Arakita called after them, once they moved to walk on the sand path and headed for the main gate.

"I had no idea you were so interested in clay pots," Maki-chan said once they were out of hearing range. Toudou could hear in his voice that he wasn't being serious. "I was waiting to get to taste French ice cream but naturally clay pots that are so ahead of their time will make up for it tenfold."

"I just didn't want them to follow us."

Maki-chan smiled with the corner of his mouth. "I noticed."

Once they reached the info, Toudou picked up a map from a rack placed on the desk. Oingt was a small country town, known for its medieval architecture. According to Mr. Pierre, it offered some sightseeing opportunities, at least if you were interested in old castles. Toudou would have been ready to see old castles, but some other time. Now, he only wished to sit in a shadow and enjoy some ice cream while watching the local way of life and the sunset.

Pretty soon it became clear that they wouldn't need the map. Very identifiable medieval buildings showed them the way. They walked in already cooling evening air, surrounded by vineyards, towards the buildings until the asphalt turned into uneven flagstones.

"What's the population of this village? Ten people?" Toudou guessed as they took in their surroundings.

Maki-chan scratched his chin, looking thoughtful. "A bit over 500, if I remember correctly."

"Really? Where do they all fit?" The center was practically one street, shadowed by ancient looking stone houses. It was beautiful though. Beautiful and idyllic, but Toudou could never picture himself living in such an ascetic place.

"People probably wonder the same thing about Tokyo."

"Mhm, but everything looks so small." Toudou fished out his camera and snapped a couple of pictures of the buildings. "Hey, Maki-chan, go stand in front of that house, beside that flower bush. I'll take your picture."

Maki-chan seemed to hesitate for a moment, but then moved to stand in the spot that Toudou had told him to.

"Smile," Toudou urged him. "I mean properly. Not that terrible clown grimace."

"I don't know how."

"Sure you do. You have a beautiful smile when it's genuine."

Only after seeing Maki-chan's face and the faint pink blossoming on his cheeks, Toudou realized what he had just blurted out. It didn't sound like something a straight guy would say to another.

Well, it was out now. He just had to keep his cool.

"Think about something funny. Something that always makes you laugh," he added.

"I _don't_ know how," his reluctant model repeated.

"Yes, you do," Toudou insisted. And he knew what he was talking about. He had seen it.

Had that guy seen Maki-chan's real smile too? Probably, if he'd been brave enough to approach him. Surely he must have seen something attractive in his target.

Unless, of course, he had had a fetish for killer clowns.

Toudou raised his camera to his face, peeking through the viewfinder. "Come on, smile now."

Maki-chan stretched his lips. The sight was like directly out of the movie It.

"What if I tell you something funny?" Toudou suggested.

"Just take the damn picture."

"I want it to be presentable. Wait a sec… okay, do you remember when yesterday Manami said about Hayato getting a ban from a buffet restaurant?"

"Yes."

"Well, that wasn't all, you see. Manami wasn't even with us back then, he was probably still lingering in middle school, but in its entirety the thing went like this. We went there together, me, Fuku and Hayato. Arakita hadn't joined the cycling club yet."

Maki-chan stared at him, looking a tad bored (but also confused).

"Anyway, the owner noticed how much Hayato ate and ended up making a bet with him. If we could eat all the food that was available in the buffet, we wouldn't have to pay the bill. We were the only customers there at the moment."

Maki-chan's lips were already twisting as he guessed where the story was heading for. "And you ate?"

"Yeah well, me and Fuku, we helped, but Hayato ate almost four times as much as us. And the trays emptied. One by one."

"So the owner told him not to come back?" Maki-chan clearly thought it was very bad business.

"Not because he ate so much but because during the last serving he threw up. On the plate, the table, the chair, even on the floor. And at that time we weren't the only customers there anymore."

Maki-chan's face was about to scrunch up in disgust, but then his mood took a U turn as he apparently pictured the setting that Toudou and Fuku had gotten into against their will.

There was the smile. Toudou snapped the picture and raised his thumb to indicate a nice shot. Maki-chan exhaled, leaving his posing spot. His hand was automatically lifting to cover his smile.

_Don't_, Toudou wanted to say. He restrained himself.

"The funny part here is the fact that I've seen Hayato throw up only twice – or in general heard about him throwing up – and now in your eyes it probably looks like that's the only thing he does."

"Mm-m… but it would be kinda hard to race if you're puking constantly."

"That's right. But don't tell him I told you."

Maki-chan was still smiling. His hands were hanging by his side, relaxed. "I won't."

"Good. Now you take my picture!"

Toudou took a step towards Maki-chan, who approached with his arm extended, ready to get the camera from him. There, during that very short walk, Toudou happened to glance at his side and his eyes spotted a figure that was disappointingly familiar.

Manami.

Shit. Double shit.

Toudou didn't have the slightest intention of socializing with the fairy prince. Instead of the camera, he grabbed Maki-chan's arm, planning to drag him to some dark side alley before they would be spotted. Unfortunately at that part of the street there weren't any side alleys, only a door to some house. Toudou bumped into the hard wood with his shoulder. It hurt. And there was more pain to follow as Maki-chan lost his balance from the force of his yank and reeled against him, squishing him into the wood. The camera hit the door with a thud.

Once they had regained their balance, Maki-chan threw a very questioning look at him. "What are you doing?" His tone gave away what he left unsaid: 'Did you throw us into a door just for the heck of it?'

Toudou brought his finger to his lips. "Shht, it's–"

But it was too late. Manami had already seen them. On such a narrow street he had probably seen their bungling too.

He waved his hand at them, grinning like the idiot he was. "Hey, Toudou-san, Makishima-san!"

Maki-chan looked at Toudou again, as if to tell him that now he understood what he'd been trying to do but anyway wanted to remark that the situation had been handled very badly anyway.

Manami caught them. There were sweat drops on his forehead and in his hand he was carrying a plastic bag that indicated that he'd been shopping. "Hey there, where are you guys going?"

"Just sightseeing," Toudou muttered. "I heard there's a medieval castle around here somewhere."

"Yeah? I'm coming from there. Pretty handsome attraction, if not a little humdrum." To boost his words, Manami opened his mouth to yawn.

"In that case, you need to go back to the camp and sleep."

"Mm, that's what I was planning to do."

They probably would have gotten rid of him with that if the door they had just manhandled had not opened and a grey-haired man in an apron hadn't stuck his nose out of it – and into their business.

"Monsieurs?" he began, continuing with a train of thick, cheerful French. Toudou understood from the tone that the guy wasn't angry even though they had bumped into his door.

"Sorry, we don't speak French," Maki-chan told the guy in English. Toudou expected the guy to apologise and leave them alone, but he changed the language smoothly.

Or maybe not that smoothly. The guy's accent was so thick that Toudou could only pick out a familiar word here and there. Amazingly, Maki-chan understood what the man was babbling about.

"We're from Japan, Monsieur. We're here to watch the Tour," he answered the guy.

The man seemed very delighted about this piece of information and continued his gibbering some more. Then he took a step back, moving to the darker side of the doorstep, and waved inside.

"What does he want?" Toudou asked.

"This is a restaurant. He says we're welcome to dine here."

Only now did Toudou notice a restaurant sign hanging above the doorway.

"Well…" he hesitated. They had come to the village to eat ice cream and ice cream was what he still wanted to have, but the delicious smell wafting from inside made his stomach wake up. It had been several hours since that Indian meal, after all. Maybe just something small…

"Do you want to eat?" he asked.

"Are you hungry?" Maki-chan asked at the same time.

Toudou laughed, pointing at the restaurant. "Do you want to have dinner here?"

"We could at least take a look at what kind of place it is."

"Yeah, we could." Though Toudou already knew that after stepping inside he wouldn't have the nerve to just leave without ordering anything. "I hope this is not a five-star restaurant."

"I'll come too," Manami said.

What?

"You... too?" Toudou looked at his young teammate.

"I'm hungry."

"Then go back to the camp and eat."

Manami had a couple of other faults too but what bothered Toudou the most was the fact that he didn't know how to (or didn't want to) take a hint.

He maybe could have been able to blackmail the brat into leaving them alone but the old man wanted them all to go to his restaurant. "The young mister too, please."

Maybe Manami would eat quickly and take his leave then. At least, if Toudou and Maki-chan claimed to go and see an attraction he had already seen. Toudou sighed and stepped inside with Maki-chan on his heels.

"It doesn't look like very expensive," Maki-chan said after taking a look at the day's specials scribbled on a chalkboard.

The old guy was tattling in English with his accent again. Maki-chan listened and then turned to Toudou and Manami. "Do you wish to eat outside? They have a small inner yard."

"Sure, why not." The building would probably offer some shadow even if they sat outside.

They were guided to a cosy small yard surrounded by stone walls. It had only three tables, a tiny fountain in the corner and ivy climbing on the walls. A marquise was pulled over it halfway, but the building itself created some shadow as the sun wasn't directly above them anymore.

"Wow, this is quite stylish," Toudou said after they had sat down. He felt like they were underdressed in their sandals, shorts and tee shirts, but the waiter didn't seem bothered. They were the only customers in the inner yard. It was a bit too early for dinner but that was fine. Toudou preferred to sit in their own company. Or would have preferred, if a certain narcoleptic pest hadn't invited himself to dinner with them.

The waiter brought them menus along with a water carafe and asked if they wanted to hear the recommendations. Toudou still couldn't understand but Maki-chan translated. It was fortunate that he knew English so well, since Mr. Pierre wasn't with them. Actually, he knew English better than anyone else Toudou knew. And his pronunciation sounded really accurate.

"He recommends smoked salmon and potato gratin on the side."

Toudou shrugged. "Sounds good." After all, he hadn't really begun his excursion for French seafood yet.

"I'll have that too," Manami added.

"So everyone will have the salmon," Maki-chan told the waiter, who burst in a new fit of babbles. Maki-chan listened for a moment, his brows furrowed, before he nodded, and the waiter handed them a new list. A drinks menu. "Now he recommends a local white wine with the dish."

"For us?" Toudou asked. They were underaged. Or what was the legal age to drink alcohol in France? It couldn't have been as low as fifteen, right? Surely the waiter saw that Manami was still a baby. "You and me? Or Manami too?"

"I don't think they're so strict here," Maki-chan reckoned. "Well, what do you say?"

"I could have a taste of it," Manami said.

"Yeah, me too," Maki-chan nodded. "Toudou, how about you?"

Hnngh! Toudou felt he was being pulled in two directions. On one hand, he wanted to be as cultivated and mature as the rest and have some wine with the meal, but his tolerance for alcohol was beyond bad. No matter what, he couldn't get drunk now, not after lecturing Shinkai and Arakita so enthusiastically.

"Well… if it is one glass," he finally muttered. It would have time to fade from his blood before they returned to the camp. He would just have to make sure that he only drank one glass of wine and a lot of water to balance it.

The waiter scribbled down their order and left to take it to the kitchen. Toudou fished his camera out of his bag again, snapping a couple of pictures of their dinner setting. He included Maki-chan in one; he hadn't noticed that Toudou was photographing and he was saved on the memory card looking thoughtful and staring into the distance. Toudou also took a picture of Manami who pulled an idiotic grin onto his face and lifted his fingers into a peace sign.

"Okay, somebody take my picture too."

Manami offered and took the camera from him. Maki-chan got up and told them that he'd pop in the bathroom. Toudou's eyes followed him automatically, taking in the green hair brushing against the back of a light blue shirt and the chinos that were hanging a bit from the butt. The same that he had borrowed in Paris. Then Manami urged him to look into the camera and Toudou turned his head, reluctant.

"Hey, could you send me the picture you took of Hayato and Arakita yesterday morning?" he asked after Manami had photographed him and he had checked that the picture was passable. The snap included a metallic sign on the wall behind him with French text and the fountain. Manami had outlined the photo so that Toudou could easily have posted it on Facebook or found use for it in his fan club. Manami wasn't that bad at photographing, he had to give the brat that.

"Sure. Do you need it for something?" Manami dug out his cell and started typing. "Like, for blackmailing purposes, perhaps?"

"Wha– No! I was just thinking it would be a fun memory of the trip." His phone beeped as it received Manami's delivery. Toudou took a quick glance at the picture, chuckling at it, before placing his phone back into his bag.

"So, Toudou-san…" Manami began. "Are you and Makishima-san an item?"

"Huh?"

"I'm not judging. Just curious." Manami stared at him with those enormous blue eyes that's specious innocence had misled so many. Toudou too, before he had learned that even though Manami was a hopeless klutz, he was also an insufferable, cunning little bastard. Innocent? No, not Manami Sangaku. There were lawyers in Hell that were more upright than Hakogaku's younger climber.

Toudou was on the verge of losing his temper, but then he realized that it would only boost Manami's suspicions (the origin of which he had no clue of). He collected his patience, looking down at the little airhead from under his lids. Or he would have, had they not been sitting and had Manami not been taller than him. Damn. "No, we're not. What makes you think that?"

For a passing, horrifying moment he suspected that Manami might have heard of Maki-chan's secret. That the thin tent fabric hadn't blocked sound at all and now their whole troop knew.

No, they had spoken with a quiet voice and Toudou hadn't heard anything from the other tents besides Tadokoro's snoring. But it could have been that the others had gone straight to sleep.

The imp shrugged. "You spend so much time together."

Didn't Manami have friends who he spent his time with? At least that tiny nerd girl with glasses. Why would you label everyone gay immediately?

"You sleep in the same tent, sit next to each other in the car – _really_ close to each other, by the way – and go everywhere together."

_Did I ask you to list things that me and Maki-chan do together?_

"We're just good friends."

"Hmm, okay. For now."

Toudou's eyes narrowed. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"You're good friends now but what about when Makishima-san finds himself a girlfriend and starts to spend all of his time with her? He won't have the time or the interest to ramble with you on the phone or online."

_Boyfriend_, Toudou corrected in his mind. _He'd spend his time with a boy._

"Why would it be Maki-chan who finds a partner? It could very well be me who starts dating first," he remarked.

"Yeah, that could happen too," Manami admitted. "I only meant that if you start dating it changes friendships. You and Makishima-san don't even go to the same school and you live far away from each other, so you don't just meet accidentally."

Toudou couldn't picture himself stopping keeping in touch with Maki-chan even if he had had a harem of girlfriends. He couldn't say about Maki-chan, but he was really hopeless with his phone anyway and contact had been on Toudou's shoulders. Sometimes he felt like Maki-chan was missing a necessary gene to keep in touch with his friends.

An image of Maki-chan hanging around with a boyfriend (or a girlfriend, what did Toudou know, maybe Maki-chan was okay with both) brought a strange, unidentifiable feeling to his chest. It felt a bit like someone or something had sat on his chest, preventing it from moving to its full extent. It made him inhale deeply a few times. He hoped that Manami was too absorbed in his own world to notice.

"Yeah well, then we'd adjust according to the situation. Dating doesn't mean that you abandon your friends. Hayato is still hanging around with us." Although, Toudou remembered the time when the relationship had still been new, and Shinkai had been absent from every voluntary happening or meeting. Later the situation had evened up, but he still didn't have as much time for his friends as before. On top of that he had that damned bunny that apparently required 24/7 babysitting.

But it didn't mean that Maki-chan would be the same. Or Toudou.

Manami took a sip out of his glass. "If you and Makishima-san have nothing going on, I suppose you wouldn't mind if someone else asked him on a date?"

"Who'd do that?" Toudou blurted out. Wow, he really sounded like nobody in their right mind would ever want to ask Maki-chan out. Which he didn't really mean, even if he had thought that Maki-chan wasn't that popular. He'd received some information suggesting the opposite only recently. "You?"

Manami smiled. "For example."

"Why the bloody hell would _you_ ask Maki-chan on a date?"

"Why not? We have quite a lot in common, actually. We both love climbing and value our own space and…"

"You forgot the tiny detail that Maki-chan is a human being and you're a freak of nature fallen from an unknown planet that the government just hasn't spotted yet."

Manami laughed his annoyingly bright little alien laugh. Toudou felt like slapping him on the mouth. He was about to add a few extra arguments – because if Manami even tried to lay his finger on Maki-chan, his Maki-chan, because he had found him first and Manami could never understand Maki-chan like Toudou did and Toudou was already in Maki-chan's coterie because he had trusted him with his secret and Manami didn't even fucking know that Maki-chan could actually like boys and…

"But 'Maki-chan' is also a bit eccentric. Who knows, we might be a good match."

"Don't call him Maki-chan!" _That name is exclusively reserved for my use only!_

Manami observed him from the shadow of his ridiculous ahoge. "Uh-oh, Toudou-san, you look like you want to kill me."

_You're right about that, you cursed gremlin. I'm so going to…_

His inner turmoil halted with the creak of a chair. The topic of their discussion had just returned and was just pulling a chair underneath him. Manami was still smiling like a lobotomy patient who'd just discovered the joys of weed. Seriously, Toudou had thought before that Arakita should have his head checked but those thoughts had vanished after he'd met Manami Sangaku. Arakita's brain was in good order in comparison to Manami's.

Maki-chan didn't ask what they had talked about even though Toudou's face was probably flaming from anger. Maki-chan never asked such things. At the same time, their dinner arrived, so Toudou had something else to think about, but he made sure to glance at Manami warningly over his plate.

The smoked salmon was good and so was the potato gratin, however, it was a lot heavier than what Toudou was used to. Including the Indian lunch, today's eating could be called gluttony. If he had had similar meals daily, he'd soon develop a mentionable spare tyre over his waist. His metabolism was quite fast but nothing compared to Shinkai's. The waiter had been right with his recommendations of wine, since it fit extremely well with the dish, even if Toudou didn't like wines in general. It had been poured in a big glass, and swallowing the last drops Toudou felt a heat on his cheeks that wasn't due to his anger.

As they had paid and it was time to stand up, his head felt a bit light but nothing that could be called intoxication. He was still planning to find that ice cream café so the effect would have time to wear off before they'd return to the camp.

After stepping back to the street the evening was turning into a night. The sun was hanging low, painting the surrounding vineyards with red. The sight was so rousing that Toudou snatched a picture of it too.

"I don't know if you'd still get inside that castle," Manami said. "It's probably closed for today."

"Well, we could always admire it from outside," Toudou said defiantly. "Isn't it time for you to head back to the camp? Onoda was asking for you and all."

Maki-chan let out a faint cough that could mean something, or then again, not.

"Sure, I'm already going." Manami flashed them one more annoying smile before he began walking down the road, whistling to himself.

Toudou wiped his forehead. "Finally we got rid of him."

Maki-chan looked at him from the corner of his eye. "You don't like Manami?"

"Manami is one of those people who are very hard to like if you don't happen to be the same kind of space cadet. Shall we go and find that ice cream now?"

"Sure, we can go, but I really hope it's not behind the next corner because I'm so full that I have to digest for a bit."

"We could walk for a while even if we found a suitable café right away. We can always come back to it," Toudou suggested. He really didn't mind even if he could spend a few extra moments in the village with Maki-chan.

They went to walk slowly up the road. The locals were amazingly friendly compared to what Toudou had experienced thus far. Many greeted them and some even stopped to try to chat with them but the attempt dried up due to the lack of a common language. Toudou was actually glad about it. He didn't feel that sociable. Manami had ruined his good mood; had got him to think about things that he hadn't considered possible until now. Perhaps he had been a bit naïve. Things couldn't stay the same forever.

"Is something wrong?" Maki-chan asked after they had idly walked for ten minutes and were running out of street, which meant that they'd have to turn back and look for an ice cream café elsewhere. They had passed some kind of coffee shop though. It might serve the treat they yearned.

"How so?"

"You're oddly quiet."

Toudou couldn't even properly rejoice about the fact that Maki-chan was so interested in his state of mind. Manami's words were rolling around in his head, repeatedly. The brat couldn't really consider asking Maki-chan out, could he? They had such a big age difference! And Manami was so _weird_. He didn't even seem to like human company but spent his time alone and seemed to be very content with his life. Why would he suddenly want to change it? Besides, Manami wasn't one of… those boys, was he? Toudou had always thought that it would somehow show, like, you could tell by the looks – there was a guy in their school that everybody just knew about, because he always gestured exaggeratedly and talked in a high-pitched voice – but on the other hand, Toudou couldn't have told about Maki-chan either.

Okay, maybe there wasn't any certainty of Manami's plans but he could always ask what Maki-chan thought about it. Even if Manami had a huge crush on him, he couldn't really force Maki-chan to go out with him.

But what if… what if Maki-chan was interested? Maybe it was hard to find partner candidates that shared his interests. Unfortunately, Manami wasn't even that ugly and his climbing style was very close to Toudou's (making it automatically elegant). Who knew if Maki-chan would agree for the lack of better options and notice that he got along well with Manami

(better than with Toudou)

and Manami would give him the space he needed and…

"Well?" Maki-chan urged him, as Toudou didn't answer and just kept staring at the road.

Toudou lifted his chin, making eye contact. "Maki-chan, would you go out with Manami if he asked you?"

* * *

A/N: Hnngh, another cliffhanger! What am I doing? And take those Maki x Manami glasses off your head right now. :D Manami is not interested in Makishima. Manami is just a cunning little imp who wants to mess with Toudou.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13 – The Charms of French ice cream**

~o~

Toudou couldn't recall when the last time Maki-chan had looked at him so flabbergasted had been. Maki-chan didn't usually react to even his most surprising questions with astonishment, only with irritation. Like that time when Toudou had asked his famous virginity question. He might not have seen or heard Maki-chan's reaction but his state of mind had been visible in the reply.

"Would I _what_?" Maki-chan finally coughed out.

"If, in theory, we assumed that Manami was going to ask you to go out with him… would you go?"

"Why the hell would _Manami _ask me out?" Toudou could see in Maki-chan's eyes the thoughts that were tumbling around inside his head. Maki-chan was belittling himself again, thinking that nobody wanted to ask him out.

"Yeah well, I mean if he was… you know. And if he imagined that you two shared some interests."

"You mean _Manami_ Manami?" Maki-chan checked. "Your younger climber?"

"That's the guy."

"That Manami who just had dinner with us?"

"Yup."

"I'm pretty sure he wouldn't ask me out."

Nggh! Toudou was sweating out of sheer frustration. Why couldn't Maki-chan just answer his question without unnecessary detours? "Yes, but _what if_?"

Maki-chan trailed off, thinking about it. Toudou waited for a moment but it took longer than what was needed to_ not _raise his suspicions. Was Maki-chan actually considering it? Going on a date with Manami? Toudou would have dated any other guy in their team before Manami. Yes, even Arakita.

"I don't know," Maki-chan said in the end. "Probably not, but it's hard to say like out of the blue."

"_Probably_ not?"

"Yes. I mean, I hardly know him. He could be a generally nice guy."

_He's not. It's all diversion. A devious scheme._

"You'd actually go out with a first-year?"

"Why not? It's not like he's a little kid."

"Yeah but…" Toudou gritted his teeth. "Would you go or would you not?"

"Hard to say. I'd have to see what kind of conditions this miracle would happen in." Maki-chan wiped hair back from his forehead. The gesture was radiating insecurity. "I'm sorry, but when I agreed to have ice cream with you, I wasn't expecting this kind of interrogation."

Toudou growled to himself. The whole thing was nagging at him more than he would have liked to admit. It felt like he wouldn't be able to enjoy ice cream before he had gotten a firm answer from Maki-chan. A firm, _negative_ answer. Because he would tear his skin inside out if Maki-chan actually started dating Manami.

_Why?_

_Why what?_

_Why would you tear your skin if Maki-chan started dating Manami? He has every right to do it._

_Because Manami is the worst calamity that humankind has experienced since the Black Death._

_Are you sure that is the real reason?_

Why wouldn't it be? Toudou was a good friend and wanted Maki-chan to date someone in his own league and not a first-year hermit. Maybe he should become Maki-chan's cupid so that he could be sure of a successful choice of partner.

He was pondering the issue when Maki-chan suddenly threw him a counter question. "Would _you_ go out with Manami if he asked you?"

"No, I wouldn't, but it has nothing to do with this."

"Why not? If you ask me that, I think it's only fair that I ask you the same thing."

"It's not the same."

"Why not?"

"Because I'm not… y'know."

"Gay?"

Toudou felt heat climbing up to his face. He was suddenly very interested in a pebble rolling around at his feet. "Yeah. Or bi. Whatever."

Maki-chan was quiet again. For absolutely too long. In fact, he was quiet for so long that Toudou started to feel very awkward. A very demanding need to say something was swelling inside him. Maybe he had been oddly quiet just a minute ago, but silence was still a difficult element for him. At least, when you were in the middle of a conversation. After half a minute, at the latest, he usually started to feel that the quietness had already lasted two hours and if either of them didn't say something soon, their friendship would be cancelled and they would be total strangers to each other.

"Listen…" he began, but Maki-chan decided to open his mouth at the same time again. Toudou squeezed his lips together, pointing at his friend.

"I don't think I would go out with Manami," Maki-chan said. "Are you happy now? Can we go and find that ice cream café?"

Toudou nodded even though he wasn't happy. His chest was constricting and he felt somehow… incomplete. Like he still should have said something, found a closure. But he didn't know what kind of solution would satisfy him so he tried to push the whole thing out of his mind.

"I think we've seen the village," Maki-chan said then. "Shall we go back to that coffee shop and see if they serve ice cream?"

Toudou nodded again. "Okay." It seemed that there wasn't a café that specialized in ice creams in this village. He had peeked at the side alleys, but they seemed to only consist of private apartments.

They turned and headed back. Toudou forced himself to speak, make remarks about their surroundings but his usual energy and cheeriness had abandoned him.

They soon found the coffee shop again. There really weren't streets to walk around in the village for hours. The place actually served ice cream. While the selection wasn't that huge, at least you could have a lot of decorations on your ice cream, such as waffles or cookies, different kind of sauces, berries and chocolate chips. Toudou didn't order as big portion as he had planned when the whole ice cream idea had popped into his head. His appetite had experienced a face plant.

Hmph, he was actually starting to get a little annoyed with his mood. Why did he have to take it so seriously? Maki-chan had said that he probably wouldn't go out with Manami. Shouldn't that have been enough?

After they had gotten their ice creams and sat down on the small patio in front of the coffee shop, Toudou opened his mouth again – not about the previous subject but about something that was quite close to it. Because it really seemed like he hadn't had his closure yet.

"Do you have some kind of ideal type of a guy?"

Maki-chan's spoon that had been on its way to his mouth stopped mid-air.

"I mean, what kind of guys do you like?" Toudou clarified. If he was to become Maki-chan's cupid, he needed to know what his preferred type of boys was.

"What way?"

"You know… the type you could go out with and stuff." Toudou said, sticking his spoon into his mouth and having the taste of lemon sorbet explode on his tongue. Wow. He took another spoonful, this time picking some strawberry flavour too. Good god. At the first taste, French ice cream was totally worth it. He immediately forgot that his stomach was full and that just minutes ago, he had suffered from a loss of appetite.

"Why do you ask?" Maki-chan asked as Toudou was still licking his spoon.

"Out of curiosity. I can reveal my own tastes after that. I mean, what kind of girls I like and stuff."

Maki-chan was quiet for a long while. His gaze was hanging on Toudou, calculating whether or not he had some ulterior motives. Toudou felt it on his temple as they were both sitting on the same side of the table, placed in the corner of the patio.

What ulterior motives could he possible have? He just sincerely wanted to know what kind of guys his friend liked.

"I don't really know."

Toudou raised his eyebrows in surprise. "You don't know?"

"They haven't really had that much in common. It's hard to define what makes a person interesting. It depends on a lot of things."

"But like 'tall', 'athletic', 'slim'. Or do you like them chubby?"

"Like I said, it depends."

Toudou huffed to himself. He first thought to keep his own tastes to himself, but a little bit of openness might get Maki-chan to talk too. Or at least let out some tiny detail.

"For example," he began. "I like girls with short hair. And the ones that are brisk but not too much. Shouldn't be too intrusive." Like some of his fans.

Maki-chan hmph'd to indicate that he was listening as he leisurely spooned ice cream into his mouth.

"And it would be nice if the girl had a sports hobby or was at least interested in sports."

"Mm-m."

Toudou waited, but his chatting partner didn't open up. Damn it. Okay, fine. Let him take his secrets to his grave then. He concentrated on his ice cream. For a while, there was only the chinking of spoons on the sides of the glass bowl. Toudou finished his treat. He actually felt like having some more but the gluttony had already gotten out of hand. He promised himself that he would have ice cream one more time during their stay in France though.

He lowered his spoon onto the table. Right. Awkward silence. Though Maki-chan didn't seem bothered by it, he was just a little absent-minded. That couldn't be called uncommon, but this time Toudou felt like he had contributed to it. His bad mood was probably contagious.

Ungh. This was not how he had pictured their evening together in a medieval village. Cursed Manami, he had totally ruined it.

"Toudou," Maki-chan began. He had finished his ice cream too, but he kept his eyes on the spoon that was resting against the side of the bowl. "Have you ever..?" He trailed off.

"Have I what?"

"Nothing."

"Go ahead. What were you saying?" Toudou urged. Maybe Maki-chan finally wanted to know about his level of experience; after all it was connected to their previous topic. He was already thinking about his answer. He was pretty sure that Maki-chan wouldn't make fun of him even if he told the truth. On the other hand, he had a serious need to give the impression that he wasn't totally inexperienced – because he was going to turn 18 in the next month and all the others were experienced and… yeah, the usual reasons – but how would he phrase it so that it wouldn't just be lying? He could always say that he had fooled around with some girls and that would be almost true. He had hugged several of his fans and those hugs had sometimes been quite intimate. One of the braver girls had groped his ass too. And Toudou's fingers had sometimes brushed against a girl's breast.

Then he saw himself placing his own experiences on a scale with Maki-chan's experiences and got discouraged. What was small groping compared to the fact that the other person had actually gotten to rub naked bodies with someone?

He wondered if Maki-chan had let the other guy top, or had he taken the more active role? Or had they even gone that far? Maybe they had only used their hands or mouths. What was even considered losing your virginity in a male-only relationship? Seriously, shouldn't there have been some guide books on the matter? Something that clearly explained what was losing your virginity and what wasn't.

He was pretty sure that touching a breast wasn't considered as such.

"You seem to be dwelling in your own world again," Maki-chan remarked.

_You too._

Oh well, it was more typical of Maki-chan than it was of him.

"Sorry." He shook his head so that he could pay better attention. "So, what were you going to say?"

Now Maki-chan didn't say anything. Instead, he was staring at the ribbons of ice cream, trickling to the bottom of the bowl.

Toudou was about to open his mouth again – about to turn everything into a joke and start talking about cycling again, because nobody could handle this kind of quietness – when Maki-chan suddenly spun towards him. The movement was so fast that Toudou was almost startled, and then Maki-chan's face was _way too close_ and his forehead was pressing against Toudou's, and his eyes, those down-turned, always so melancholic eyes, overlapped in his line of vision, and he sensed a warm, mildly wine and lemon scented breath ghost over his face.

_Oh my god! What is happening?!_

_Somebody help me! Waiter! Fuku! Mom!_

He realized that he was only screaming inside his head. In reality, he was completely stunned into silence. His mouth was slightly agape but there was a lock straining his jaws, preventing him from letting out a sound. Every muscle in his body was tense. His blood was thundering in his ears and his heart was pounding in his chest like an uncontrolled earthmover. He was pretty sure that Maki-chan could hear it too. Surely he had to, as Toudou felt like he couldn't hear anything over the rampaging pumping. Also, he had to feel his pulse on his forehead, as the vein was flattened between two bones. Or was it Maki-chan's? Toudou couldn't say for sure.

He swallowed. The sound was hollow inside his head. "Is that your vein or mine?"

_Wow. Tonight live on our 'The stupidest things you can say in an intimate or almost intimate situation' show._ Had they been in a middle of a soap opera shooting, Toudou would have gotten fired immediately.

Maki-chan blinked, but didn't break the skin contact. "I'm not sure. Maybe yours."

"Why do you think that?"

"It's pulsing so hard."

_Isn't yours then?_

How unfair that Maki-chan was completely relaxed when Toudou was in the middle of ruining his shirt with sweat. It was fortunate that his sweat didn't smell because his deodorant was about to betray him. He wasn't worried about that. Instead, he was worried about the things like his blood circulation, which was dabbling at a certain part of his body, about 20 centimeters south from his belly button.

Oh shit. This was bad. He was even wearing stupid loose and light shorts that couldn't hide anything. How the hell would he get out of this jam?

_Maki-chan, what are you doing?_

His tongue refused to co-operate with him once again. Seriously, what the hell?

"I was just…" Maki-chan was talking in a soft voice, softer than Toudou remembered ever hearing, and how could Maki-chan not blink for that long, when his own lids seemed to flutter ten times a second and water despite it, because he was staring at another person from a couple of centimeters away? "Have you really thought this through?"

_Thought what? What? Christ on a fake pony, what?!_

He could have actually used some kind of divine entity in a situation in which he was about to get an erection from touching his best friend. Toudou tried with his sheer willpower to keep the blood away from his crotch, but the guy downstairs hadn't really respected his wishes for a few years now.

How was it possible to get a boner and be this nervous at the same time?

"Wh-what?" he finally managed to cough out. He wished that Maki-chan would have backed off even a little bit. He was finding it so hard to concentrate; his thoughts were staggering around in his head and he couldn't arrange them in the forms of proper sentences. Only then did he start to realize that Maki-chan wasn't holding on to him. Nobody was holding on to him. He could have, at any time, leaned back and detached himself from the touch. He hadn't done it.

"Why are you so concerned about whether or not I would go out with Manami?"

"I'm not… I mean… Manami is… Manami is, like, the most annoying person on this planet."

"But it wouldn't be you dating him. It would be me."

"Yeah but… if you were dating Manami…" _What would happen to our friendship?_

Maki-chan didn't say anything anymore, only waited. Toudou waited too, for the words to find him again. For him to find an explanation that would sound reasonable, if only in his own ears. It wasn't looking that good.

When the silence had lasted for about fifty years, Maki-chan sighed, withdrawing to his own side. The touch left a burning spot on Toudou's forehead. His eyes were still blinking too much, as he tried to get some sense back into the world.

"Shall we go back? It's almost nine," Maki-chan said then, and was already climbing to his feet.

"W-wait," Toudou spluttered. He really couldn't get up now. Oh, how he hoped that he had worn tight underwear today, but no, under his loose shorts he had even looser silk boxers. He had to wait for a while for his boner to vanish. Actually, it should have vanished from the shock; from the thought that it had had the nerve to actually appear in such situation.

Maki-chan stopped to stand behind his chair with his other hand resting on the back of it. Toudou was sitting rigid as a statue, his hand squeezed to cover his lap, and suspecting that his face was going through several shades of red at varying speeds. Maki-chan didn't ask why he needed to wait. Perhaps he thought that Toudou had finally come up with an explanation.

Toudou, like the rest of the guys, had his tricks of getting rid of an unwanted erection, because sometimes that damned appendage just decided to jump on stage in the middle of a class, usually at the moment when the teacher asked you to come and write on the board. The best trick was to start ruminating over an unsolved problem, for example, how to explain to a teacher that an assignment from a week before still wasn't finished or to think about someone very repulsive, like one of the older teachers dancing in bikinis and wiggling their old, saggy meat.

"Well?" Maki-chan asked eventually, when Toudou didn't say anything.

"I need to go to the bathroom," he grunted.

"Go on then. You don't need my permission."

"Yes but…" _Think, idiot, think!_ "My stomach feels weird and I really don't want to stand up yet."

Maki-chan looked at him carefully, but this time there was a touch of concern on his face. "Are you lactose intolerant? That strawberry ice cream probably had milk in it."

"Not that I know of, but maybe French milk is different. It could still be the Indian food too." Toudou exhaled and rocked back and forth a few times as if to indicate that he really had stomach problems and he wasn't trying to hide an even more normal function of his body. His digestion had been on a rollercoaster ride after the spicy lunch but those effects had passed hours ago.

The situation was quickly becoming embarrassing, finally making his pole drop the flag and enabling him to stand up.

"It passed," he said. "I think I can make it to the camp."

"Are you sure?"

"Yup. I'm fine now."

"Alright then." Behind Maki-chan's complying there lurked a hidden hope that Toudou wouldn't crap his pants in the middle of their walk back.

As they approached the camping area, Toudou got hit by a feeling that he absolutely needed to talk to someone right now. Someone trustworthy. Someone who wouldn't judge. Someone who could give him their unbiased (or biased, whatever) advice.

Someone like Maki-chan.

Damn. Now that he really needed his friend, he couldn't actually rely on him. Maki-chan had trusted him with his secret and now when he had something he could share in return, he had to find someone else. But who then? Shinkai? No, he was too straight. Fuku? Too... too everything. Arakita he couldn't even think about, let alone Manami who had caused the whole episode. That left only Izumida, who probably would have listened but Toudou didn't know him well enough.

He was out of choices. He couldn't even call his sisters, not from this far. He was alone with his problems.

Back at the camp they met Shinkai and Arakita, and naturally the black-haired teammate remembered to ask how incredibly amazing those clay pots had been. Toudou answered that the pots had undeniably been rather interesting, especially because of the erotic images carved in them. That wiped the smirk off of Arakita's face. They didn't see Manami, and that was good, because Toudou would probably have thrown him face-first into the nearest trash can.

They headed straight to the bathrooms to take an evening shower. Toudou made sure that he took his clothes off without Maki-chan seeing him – in this bathroom that was arranged well in the form of big, private booths. Maybe it looked a bit like Toudou thought Maki-chan was a pervert or something, though yesterday evening in the shower he had acted normally. If Maki-chan noticed his unusual behaviour, he didn't mention it. They showered, got dressed and headed back to the camp.

The sky had darkened during the last half an hour, and as they had reached their tent, the air smelled like rain and there were faint drops dappling their skin. Until now, the weather had, amazingly, been on their side. Luckily, they got hit by a full downpour only after they had managed to crawl inside their tiny-ass sleeping quarters (yes, Toudou had agreed to switch with Shinkai and Arakita but the tent was designed for ants. Fortunately, neither he nor Maki-chan had a tendency to roll around in their sleep).

Toudou closed the zipper and stopped to listen to the rain splashing against the fabric. The sky was really giving its best shot. Hopefully it would be a quick shower. A couple of hours and their camp would flood.

Sitting in a tent that was being drummed upon by rain was sort of atmospheric. Almost all of the light had disappeared, leaving them in the dim. There were light poles here and there around the camping area and also by their spot, but it didn't really help. If you wanted to read, you'd have to hold the book a few centimeters from your face.

Toudou wasn't planning to read. He wormed his way inside his sleeping bag, trying to settle down comfortably in the cramped space. Maki-chan was already lying on his back, his arm underneath the pillow to lift his head a bit higher. The tiny space hadn't bothered Toudou before, but now he was aware of Maki-chan's every breath and movement. He felt them against his side and heard every rustle.

"It's raining quite hard," he said, trying to sound more like himself.

"Yep. I hope the tent can hold it."

"It should."

They heard voices from outside. Shinkai was saying something, to which Arakita answered. Toudou listened carefully and could make out bits that indicated that their tent hadn't been designed to handle heavy downpours. Weird. Weren't tents usually made to take any kind of weather? Why did tents even exist if they weren't any better than a sheet stretched between two poles?

"I hope they're not planning to squeeze themselves in here," he muttered.

Maki-chan was quiet first, looking like he was still listening to the outside voices. "I don't think so. It sounds like they went to ask for the car keys from Kinjou."

"If another tent fails, it will be quite crowded in the back of the van."

Voices continued. Apparently Tadokoro went to help Shinkai and Arakita detach the seats; Toudou could make out his gruff voice. The ado continued for some minutes, then the car door slammed and Tadokoro returned to his tent. Toudou could tell because the tent in question was right next to them. But he couldn't make out the words from inside it. Not over the rain.

The camp quietened down. There was the sound of pouring water but nobody was talking. Toudou considered whether he should just go to sleep and hope that the world would look like before in the morning, but then he heard Maki-chan inhale in a way that usually preceded talking.

"Sorry if I scared you," he muttered. "I mean, before."

"You didn't… you didn't scare me," Toudou answered. _I scared myself on my own._ Besides, it had been him who had asked stupid questions.

He wanted to ask what Maki-chan had meant with his gesture. Had he aimed for something? Of course he had, you didn't do such things on a whim. And his eyes had been so… demanding. Like he had been trying to make Toudou understand something, read between the lines.

What if… what if Maki-chan hadn't..?

What if it hadn't been their foreheads that had been pressed together but..?

Already familiar wave of heat was flushing over his face again. And not just that, but his body too. How on Earth was it possible to create such hot flashes with only the power of your mind? He was like a freaking middle-aged bag with menopause. He was thankful that it was so dark in the tent. Maki-chan would probably have wondered why he was suddenly turning into a boiled lobster.

Toudou prayed for an invisible fan to materialize on the ceiling to cool off his burning face. Naturally it didn't happen.

"It was just a bit unexpected, is all," he continued. His voice was muffled in the edge of the sleeping bag, coming out as a subdued mumble.

His words were followed by yet another silence. He hoped that Maki-chan would just spit out what was in his mind. Because he could sense it. His friend was brooding over something.

"What did you want to say to me back there in the village?" he finally asked.

"Nothing special."

_Yes, you did. It was most definitely something special._

"You can talk to me," Toudou promised. "What did you mean by that question, have I thought this through?" _Thought what?_

Maki-chan sighed. "Toudou..."

"Sorry, but this is really bugging me. You were so mysterious before… and that thing in the coffee shop and…"

"You are sometimes so slow that I suspect your other hemisphere is permanently hibernating."

_What? What?!_

"That is so rude, Maki-chan! I'm not slow and my hemisphere is not hibernating! It's just that to understand your train of thought a person would require a super computer that human kind hasn't just managed to inve–"

His mouth was closed.

In fact, it was closed quite effectively.

With another mouth.

He felt his eyes bulge in his head as Maki-chan was suddenly so close that he could smell the shampoo in his hair – even though he hadn't washed his hair since last night – that green, leafy scent that seemed to always follow him.

He wasn't sure if he should have been able to identify the scent of Maki-chan's shampoo. He wasn't sure if he should have remembered that Maki-chan had washed his hair last night.

He was so close that Toudou couldn't see the blue irises anymore – no, it could be due to the fact that his eyes were closed – and he was still lying on his back, but there was something heavy and breathing and alive resting over the right side of his body, and that too smelled like leafy meadows and it made the hot flashes return with the force of a tsunami. For a moment, he couldn't comprehend why he was paying attention to everything else when his attention should have been in the lower part of his face, since that was the spot… the spot that he should have paid attention to. Because there was another mouth there. Warm, slightly moist lips that were pressing against his, hesitant and at the same time determined.

Maki-chan was wrong. Toudou wasn't slow. He was rapidly taking notes from his surroundings. Like the fact that he was just being kissed. And that it was his first real kiss, even if the lips were closed. He could also infer that the kisser was Maki-chan, which didn't actually require that sharp of a brain, since there was nobody in the tent besides them and it was pretty hard for a person to kiss themselves. And the fact that he…

..that he was kissing back. And that wasn't even all, but his hand was groping Maki-chan's green hair and pulling him closer to crush their lips firmly together, and when Maki-chan parted his lips, Toudou's tongue tried to sneak inside from between them and he tasted hints of the lemon sorbet and a touch of something that was all Maki-chan and…

And then, as quickly as it had begun, it was over. Toudou tore himself away when understanding pierced his consciousness, alarmed him of what he was doing. That he was doing something he didn't usually do. What he had never done before, ever.

(Hopefully Maki-chan didn't think he was a bad kisser.)

He was breathing hard like after the hardest mountain stage, staring through the darkness into the eyes of his rival, friend and travelling companion, and voiced the only question that could break away from the obscure mass that was his scattered thoughts.

"Maki-chan, _what_ are we doing?"

* * *

A/N: "That's the guy." Why do I hear Toudou saying this in Tommy Wiseau's voice? "Oh, hi Johnny, I didn't know it was you." "That's me." Go and see The Room. It's horrible. :D


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